The sins of Youth are hardly sins,
So frank they are and free.
‘T is but when Middle-age begins
We need morality.
Ah, pause and weigh this bitter truth:
That Middle-age, grown cold,
No comprehension has of Youth,
No pity for the Old.
Youth, with his half-divine mistakes,
She never can forgive,
So much she hates his charm which makes
Worth while the life we live.
She scorns Old Age, whose tolerance
And calm, well-balanced mind
(Knowing how crime is born of chance)
Can pardon all mankind.
Yet she, alas! has all the power
Of strength and place and gold,
Man’s every act, through every hour,
Is by her laws controlled.
All things she grasps with sordid hands
And weighs in tarnished scales.
She neither feels, nor understands,
And yet her will prevails!
Cold-blooded vice and careful sin,
Gold-lust, blind selfishness,–
The shortest, cheapest way to win
Some, worse than cheap, success.
Such are her attributes and aims,
Yet meekly we obey,
While she to guide and order claims
All issues of the day.
You seek for honour, friendship, truth?
Let Middle-age be banned!
Go, for warm-hearted acts, to Youth;
To Age,–to understand!

A few random poems:
- A Memory Of Youth by William Butler Yeats
- Eclogue:–The Times by William Barnes
- Fox
- Sonnet. Why Did I Laugh Tonight? poem – John Keats poems
- A Shropshire Lad poem – John Betjeman poems | Poems and Poetry
- Eucalyptus Grove, morning by Neal Dachstadter
- Владимир Высоцкий – Там были генеральши, были жёны офицеров
- Николай Карамзин – Странные люди
- The Gardener XIII: I Asked Nothing by Rabindranath Tagore
- It was an April morning: fresh and clear by William Wordsworth
- Степан Щипачев – Ровеснику
- Waiting by Rohith
- Epistle to John Maxwell, Esq., of Terraughty by Robert Burns
- Федор Сологуб – В лес пришла пастушка
- Orlando Furioso Canto 19 by Ludovico Ariosto
External links
Bat’s Poetry Page – more poetry by Fledermaus
Talking Writing Monster’s Page –
Batty Writing – the bat’s idle chatter, thoughts, ideas and observations, all original, all fresh
Poems in English
- Night-Piece by Siegfried Sassoon
- Night on the Convoy by Siegfried Sassoon
- Morning-Land by Siegfried Sassoon
- Morning-Glory by Siegfried Sassoon
- Morning Express by Siegfried Sassoon
- Miracles by Siegfried Sassoon
- Middle-Ages by Siegfried Sassoon
- Memory by Siegfried Sassoon
- Memorial Tablet by Siegfried Sassoon
- Lovers by Siegfried Sassoon
- Limitations by Siegfried Sassoon
- Lamentations by Siegfried Sassoon
- Joy-Bells by Siegfried Sassoon
- Invocation by Siegfried Sassoon
- ‘In the Pink’ by Siegfried Sassoon
- In Me, Past, Present, Future meet by Siegfried Sassoon
- In Barracks by Siegfried Sassoon
- Idyll by Siegfried Sassoon
- I Stood With the Dead by Siegfried Sassoon
- How to Die by Siegfried Sassoon
More external links (open in a new tab):
Doska or the Board – write anything
Search engines:
Yandex – the best search engine for searches in Russian (and the best overall image search engine, in any language, anywhere)
Qwant – the best search engine for searches in French, German as well as Romance and Germanic languages.
Ecosia – a search engine that supposedly… plants trees
Duckduckgo – the real alternative and a search engine that actually works. Without much censorship or partisan politics.
Yahoo– yes, it’s still around, amazingly, miraculously, incredibly, but now it seems to be powered by Bing.
Parallel Translations of Poetry
The Poetry Repository – an online library of poems, poetry, verse and poetic works
Violet Nicolson ( 1865 – 1904); otherwise known as Adela Florence Nicolson (née Cory), was an English poetess who wrote under the pseudonym of Laurence Hope, however she became known as Violet Nicolson. In the early 1900s, she became a best-selling author. She committed suicide and is buried in Madras, now Chennai, India.