Analysis of A Likely Lad

Child of a myriad varied voices calling
O'er countless leagues of space in divers tongues,
Tho' captious critics view your ways appalling
And fain would quiet your all too strident lungs,
Raw youth must have its fling; and ten brief summers
Hardly suffice to make you a sage;
So, ‘spite your crooners, clowns and jazz-drunk strummers,
You have not done so badly for your age.

Much water has flowed down many a river
(The McIntyre at Yetman, let us say)
Since first you set ethereal waves a-quiver
With that crude babbling of your natal day.
You're growing up, my lad, and waxing wiser;
Tho' still the crabbed, impatient censors rage.
As entertainer and as advertiser
You have not done so badly for your age.

And many lonely men in lonely places,
Have hailed you as a blessing and a joy,
Condoning all your rather callow graces
And that omniscient air that you employ,
Tho' still much over-prone to raucous bawling.
As boys will be, you're learning, stage by stage,
The wiser, weightier aspects of your calling,
You have not done so badly for your age.

Since days when first we fumbled the cat's-whisker,
And strained at ear-phones, yearning for a sound,
Your lighter moods have brighter grown, and brisker,
Your interludes of wisdom more profound.
If, thro' the next ten years, you keep on growing
To man's estate, and statelier arts engage,
You may please everyone; there is no knowing.
Still, you have not done badly for your age.