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"And dark our celebration was;
For Death was sweet to us;
By that I mean it filled our sacks so full
We leaned atilt round moonlit corners of the town
And sprinted on to doorways where we buzzed and rang
And lit the pumpkin windows and held forth our hands
To take the treasures of the time,
The run again, the lovely thistle girls and I
Gone old within a night yet young with them.
How grand such Eves, how good such girls.
That they slowed pace for ancient boys like me
Who could not give it up, stay at home, put by the holiday.
I had to go, to lurch, to tap, to laugh, to walk at last
All happy-tired cold wind blowing
With the full-lit moon to wife and hearth and aunts
Come by to wait for us: the crazy man and his wild pride
Of maiden beasts.
Long years ahead, dear girls, on nights like those,
Do please drop by at dusk, come sit upon my stone
And speak glad words
To spirit gone but wishing to be still.
With you when you go forth with your own children
Thus to filch and prize and laugh at every door.
No more. I stay.
But save for me a single sweet, some Milky Way to munch
Or bring a pumpkin cut and lit and place it so to warm my feet.
Then on the path run, go! knowing that I'm not dead,
For you are my head, my heart, my limbs, my blood set free;
You are the me that is warm,
I am the me that is cold,
You are the me that is young,
I old.
But what of that!?
Death's mean at all his Tricks, God, yes,
But you the Treats
Who run to beg my life and yours
In all the Future's wild, delirious, dark
But warm and livi