Though you were old and grey and full of sleep,
In a Hall lit only with fire, you still held a strength
Only slowly fading, and a dream of the proud sight
Your eyes once had, and of their memories deep;
How many had loved your years of noble grace,
And loved your glory with love false or true;
But Merry loved the caring soul in you,
And loved the sorrows of your changing face.
And bending down before your aged knees
Murmured, a little sadly, how like a father
You were to him, among many strangers:
And you took his hand in friendship free.
Though you, counted amid the great, then rarely smiled,
And he only a lonely halfling, between you there was a love;
You in your Winter years warmed by his honest Spring.
Like a father you were, to him, - for a little while.
