The Old Cafe

You know,      Don't you, Joe,      Those merry evenings long ago?      You know the room, the narrow stair,      The wreaths of smoke that circled there,      The corner table where we sat      For hours in after-dinner chat,      And magnified      Our little world inside.      You know,      Don't you, Joe?      Ah, those nights divine!      The simple, frugal wine,      The airs on crude Italian strings,      The joyous, harmless revelings,      Just fit for us - or kings!      At times a quaint and wickered flask      Of rare Chianti, or from the homelier cask      Of modest Pilsener a stein or so,      Amid the merry talk would flow;      Or red Bordeaux      From vines that grew where dear Montaigne      Held his domain.      And you remember that dark eye,      None too shy;      In fact, she seemed a bit too free      For you and me.      You know,      Don't you, Joe?      Then Pegasus I knew,      And then I read to you      My callow rhymes      So many, many times;      And something in the place      Lent them a certain grace,      Until I scarce believed them mine,      Under the magic of the wine;      But now I read them o'er,      And see grave faults I had not seen before,      And wonder how      You could have listened with such placid brow,      And somehow apprehend      You sank the critic in the friend.      You know,      Don't you, Joe?      And when we talked of books,      How learned were our looks!      And few the bards we could not quote,      From gay Catullus' lines to Milton's purer note.      Mayhap we now are wiser men,      But we knew more than all the scholars then;      And our conceit      Was grand, ineffable, complete!      We know,      Don't we, Joe?      Gone are those golden nights      Of innocent Bohemian delights,      And we are getting on;      And anon,      Years sad and tremulous      May be in store for us;      But should we ever meet      Upon some quiet street,      And you discover in an old man's eye      Some transient sparkle of the days gone by,      Then you will guess, perchance,      The meaning of the glance;      You'll know,      Won't you, Joe?