All creaks of every shoe size
Heard before in aging, ebbed ears
One realises from nudge of eye
A strand of ginger, uncurled in fear
These hollow halls lacking window panes
Makes one seize in bitter lunacy
All attempts to boast ends in vain
All ardour ceases to be in this
Wooden shaft, scourged by a million wands
Whose tender pulse is absent in his ancient grip
Only to respond to a specimen of greater attitude
And with envious colours, have its first breath equip
And to see those sharp eyes shine in innocent hope
Of which his archaic pupils find themselves too crippled
To reach, but perhaps such spectacle is enough to rope
on a man withering away into the inevitable