Brian Routh's poem is about accepting solitude as something every person has to face. The speaker announces that it is time to withdraw, close off rooms, and stop leaning on others. Birth and death, he says, are moments we go through alone, with no hand to hold and no mother to cling to. That idea returns in the image of trees, whose leaves drink "mother's milk" and then detach and fall.
The feeling is heavy and uneasy. There is a sense of resolve, but also real pain: "agonising moments of heart's despair," and a sound that echoes back "to sender" with nothing answering it. Near the end, the speaker recalls the passion of earlier dreams, vows, and talk of God and glory, then seems to let them go. "All will wither / no more sound."
The mood is quiet, bare, and sombre. The short, broken lines make it feel like someone thinking aloud, trying to face an empty future without comfort.