January the First

Sweetest wishes didst thou send
For a New Year's greeting friend!
"Many pleasant years may we
Together yet in friendship see!
If the Day of Dooming nears,
Many sweet uncounted years!"

Ah, but here and now we know
Each the other's outward show!
How to find you there and then,
Tho' you be a man of men,
If I see not eye and brow
Fashioned as I see them now?

Ugly thought, that we may meet,
Nor feel sure enough to greet.
Have you neither doubts nor fears
Of the strange, uncounted years?