University of Virginia Library

THE COMING-FORTH OF STARS

AT MIDSUMMER EVENING

Hark, out of all the neighbouring forest hum
The mingled voices of a myriad things,
A sound that half is silence listening)—
Birds, insects loud with summer, brooks that creep,
How through the dark and flutter into the light,
As if with prisoned wings,) then hurry on;
And the light, lazy turning evermore
Of restless leaves unnumbered, half-asleep
And yet unsleeping. These, while twilight draws
Great dewy veils in silence over all,
Breathe my old indolence a newer spell,
Till, all forgetful of the hour, I see,
Winking above a western cloud, the star
Beloved by lovers—hers the lover's friend,—
And, underneath the boughs and far and near,
The fireflies climbing into dusky air,
Lifting their million stars from grass and weed
Wet with the dew; meanwhile, the stars on high
Start, one by one—from cells invisible,—
Visible in the darkness suddenly,
Contemporaries of the dreamy hour.
Oh, dear to me the coming-forth of stars!
After the trivial tumults of the day
They fill the heaven, they hush the earth with awe
And, when my life is fretted overmuch
With transient nothings, it is good, I deem,
From darkling windows to look forth and gaze
At this new blossoming of Eternity
'Twixt each to-morrow and each dead to-day;
Or else, with solemn footsteps modulate
To spheral music, wander forth and know
Their radiant individualities,
And feel their presence newly; hear again
The silence that is God's voice speaking, slow
In starry syllables, forevermore.