COME, WHEN THE EVENING INTO SILENCE CLOSES.
I.
Come, when the evening into silence closes,
When the pale stars steal out upon the blue;
And watchful zephyrs to the virgin roses,
Descend in sweetest murmurs, bringing dew;
Come to the heart that sadly then declining,
Would need a soothing day has never known;
Come, like those stars upon the night-cloud shining,
And bless me with a beauty all thine own.
Beauty of songs and tears,
And blessed tremulous fears—
Beauty that shrinks from every gaze but one:
Ah! for the dear delight,
The music of thy sight,
I yield the day, the lonely day, and live for night alone.
II.
It is no grief that in the night hour only,
The love that is our solace may be sought;
Day mocks the soul that is in rapture lonely,
And voices break the spell with sorrow fraught;
Better that single, silent star above us,
And still around us that subduing hush,
As of some brooding wing, ordain'd to love us,
That spells the troubled soul and soothes its gush;
Shadows that still beguile,
Sorrows that wear a smile,
Griefs that in dear delusions lead away—
And oh! that whispering tone,
Breathed, heard, by one alone,
That, as it dies—a wordless sound—speaks more than words can say
