Sonnets To A Friend: Ix Poem by Alexander Anderson

I know thou wilt. And so to me the past
Is richer from my pleasant days with thee,
And wears a happy memory to me,
That, though the years may dim and die, will last.
We were not as we said with jest and smile,
'Two idle dreamers of an empty day;'
The future takes its colour and display
From what is best within us. So the while
There might be rising to the inner ken
The larger nature which must come with thought
Grown wider from a wider view of earth,
And earnest purposes to shape our lot
To all the grander things that take their birth
Wherever God reveals Himself to men.