 XIII

When I was one-and-twenty
 I heard a wise man say,
"Give crowns and pounds and guineas
 But not your heart away;
The speaker is reflecting back on the man he was a year ago. 
 Twenty-one is about college age. Housman himself, while an undergraduate at Oxford,  developed strong feelings for his roommate Moses Jackson.  Jackson was heterosexual and didn’t reciprocate, but helped inspire many of Housman’s later poems of thwarted love. In the collection  More Poems ,  one lyric begins: 
 Because I liked you better Than suits a man to say, It irked you and I promised To throw the thought away. 
 
 Moses Jackson
When I Was One-and-Twenty