‘When You Are Old’ is a short love poem in which the poet uses a time frame in which the speaker addresses his lady love in the present, takes her to an unreal condition in the future, and asks her to recall her past memories. He does so, in order to persuade her or warn her not to ignore him and make a wrong decision.

The poet’s point of view is the most compelling point of the poem. The narrator is calling upon a woman that is not yet through with youth to, once past her prime, recall the days he was in her life and very much in love with her. Obviously, he wants her to remember him for his unique and unconditional love for her, and how she is choosing to ignore it in the present. By writing this poem in this fashion, the woman, when the poet hopes that she grows old, will remember the days when she was young with happiness but will grow regretful that she did not take advantage of his love.

Alternatively, the woman, in the present will see what an opportunity she is missing by ignoring his love for her and leaving him to fade into the past. The speaker fears that his lady love will not act upon his love for her and that she will only remember him in the book of memories. He hopes that if, once old, she puts down the book of memories, she will grow chilly and sorrowful that she did not foresee how steadfast his love was but how foolish she was for taking no notice of it. He is already fearful that she will grow old without him, and this can be seen as he requests that she remember him a ‘little sadly’ and as a missed chance to have a happy future.

It is the time frame that the poet has used in this poem that facilitates the poet to write this sad and reminiscent poem which is not designed primarily to make an old woman regretful, but to keep a young woman from ignoring the narrator and making the wrong decision.