Night
The night is young yet; an enchanted night
In early summer: calm and darkly bright.
I love the Night, and every little breeze
She brings, to soothe the sleep of dreaming trees.
Hearst thou the Voices? Sough! Susurrus!— Hark!
’Tis Mother Nature whispering in the dark!
Burden of cities, mad turmoil of men,
That vex the daylight—she forgets them then.
Her breasts are bare; Grief gains from them surcease:
She gives her restless sons the milk of Peace.
To sleep she lulls them—drawn from thoughts of pelf—
By telling sweet old stories of herself.
All secrets deep—yea, all I hear and see
Of things mysterious—Night reveals to me.
I know what every flower, with drowsy head
Down-drooping, dreams of—and the seeming dead.
I know how they, escaped from care and strife,
Ironically moralise on Life.
And know what—when the moon walks on the waves—
They whisper to each other in their graves.
I know that white clouds drifting from stark coasts
Across the sky at midnight are the ghosts
Of sailors drowned at sea, who yearn to win
A quiet grave beside their kith and kin
In still green graveyards, where they lie at ease
Far from the sound of surge and roar of seas.
I know the message of the mournful rain
That beats upon the widow’s window-pane.
I know the meaning of the roar of seas;
I know the glad Spring sap-song of the trees;
And that great chant to which in tuneful grooves
The green round earth upon its axis moves;
And that still greater chant the Bright Sun sings—
Fire-crowned Apollo—the great chant that brings
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poem by Victor James Daley
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