Around the corner

 

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Around the corner I have a friend

In this great city that has no end;

Yet days go by and weeks rush on,

And before I know it a year is gone,

And I never see my old friend’s face,

For Life is a swift and terrible race.

He knows I like him just as well

As in the days when I rang his bell

And he rang mine. We were younger then,

And now we are busy tired men:

Tired with playing a foolish game,

Tired of trying to make a name.

"Tomorrow," I say. "I will call on Jim,

just to show I am thinking of him"

But tomorrow comes--and tomorrow goes,

And the distance between us grows and grows.

 

Around the corner!--yet miles away……

"here’s a telegram sir….."

"Jim died today"

And that’s what we get and deserve in the end:

Around the corner a vanished friend.

 

Charles Hanson Towne