A little more tired at the close of day,
A little more anxious to have our way,
A little less likely to scold and to blame,
A little more care for a brothers name;
And so we are nearing the journey’s end,
Where time and eternity meet and blend.

A little less care for bonds or gold,
A little more care for the days of old;
A broader view and a saner mind,
And a little more love for all mankind;
And so we are faring down the way
That leads to the gates of a better day.

A little more love for the friends of youth,
A little more zeal for established truth,
A little more charity in our views,
A little less thirst for the daily news;
And so we are folding our tents away
And passing in silence at close of day.

A little more leisure to sit and dream,
A little more real the things unseen,
A little nearer to those ahead,
With visions of those long loved and dead;
And so we are going where all must go—
To the place the living may never know.

A little more laughter, a few more tears,
And we will have told our increasing years,
The book is closed and the prayers are said,
And we are part of the countless dead;
Thrice happy, then, if some soul can say,
“I live because of their help on the way.”

R.G.Wells