The Old Ruins Poem by Alexander Anderson

Ah, the stream by the ruin in the wood
Has long ago run dry,
And the only voice in the solitude
Is the wind that rushes by.


And human work has shared its fate,
And the ruins are old and green,
And you push aside the rotten gate,
But no living form is seen.


And you step where weeds spring into birth,
Where flowers grew up of yore,
But you look in vain for human mirth
Through the nettles at the door.


Yet I like to come in the sober eve
And stand in this decay,
And build from out the things that grieve
A gladness pass'd away.


Then I see in those quaint dreamings still
A cottage neat and fair,
With a window looking to the hill,
And a rose tree climbing there.


And I see in the doorway a maiden meek,
In her novel duty rife,
With the blushes yet upon her cheek
At the gentle name of wife.


Then I hear, as the night comes stealing on,
The prattle of little words,
And a manly voice that takes up the tone,
And echoes in deeper chords.


Then I see before the half-shut door,
In the wavy heat of day.
Just by the stream that leaps no more,
A band of children play.


And I hear the light sweet laugh that springs
From the prison of the breast,
Like a bird that leaps with joyous wings
Above her hidden nest.


Then I see tall youths and maidens fair
Around the evening hearth,
And a grey-hair'd sire and a mother there,
Who smile on their happy mirth.


But a shadow creeps down on the light I see,
And withers as with a blight
The once-sweet picture, that never can be
Brought out from the past's still night.


Then I waken up from my dreams at this,
As if a voice had said,
'Now what is the sum of human bliss
When that which had life is dead?'


So I turn away from the ruins again,
Half-wroth that I should dream,
But stop where the footbridge steps in vain
Across the vanish'd stream.


I look for a moment over the ledge
To see the grasses spring,
And trail their length within the edge,
Where the stream was wont to sing.


But a sadder question within me starts,
As I turn from all I view;
For where, O where, are human hearts,
When they dry their channels too?