Three Airs for the Beggar's Opera, Air XXII

Youth's the season made for joys, 
Love is then our duty; 
She alone who that employs, 
Well deserves her beauty. 
Let's be gay, 
While we may, 
Beauty's a flower despis'd in decay.

Let us drink and sport to-day, 
Ours is not tomorrow. 
Love with youth flies swift away, 
Age is nought but sorrow. 
Dance and sing, 
Time's on the wing, 
Life never knows the return of spring.

This poem is in the public domain.