And catch, in sudden gleams,
The sheen of the far-surrounding seas,
And islands that were the Hesperides
Of all my boyish dreams.
And the burden of that old song,
It murmurs and whispers still:
'A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'

"I remember the black wharves and the slips,
And the sea-tides tossing free;
And Spanish sailors with bearded lips,
And the beauty and mystery of the ships,
And the magic of the sea.
And the voice of that wayward song
Is singing and saying still:
'A boy's will is the wind's will,
And the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts.'"

Longfellow's earliest volume, "The Voices of the Night," was one of the
few books of American poetry that some of us who are now growing old
ourselves can remember reading, just as we were emerging from childhood.
"The Reaper and the Flowers" and the "Psalm of Life,"--I recall the
delight with which I used to repeat those poems. The latter, so full of
suggestions which a very young person could feel, but only half
understand, was for that very reason the more fascinating. It seemed to
give glimpses, through opening doors, of that wonderful new world of
mankind, where children are always longing to wander freely as men and
women. Looking forward and aspiring are among the first occupations of
an imaginative child; and the school-boy who declaimed the words: