Golden Histories, etc :: :: University of Virginia Library

The stars in heaven are silver-fair,
The honied scents of the woodbine float,
On the smooth wave of the moon-warm air;
The thistle-down flies o'er the castle moat,
And no owl is hooting thro' the night.

Joy wakes and sings in my heart of hearts,
My soul is feeding among the flowers.
The sorrow is dead and the cloud departs,
And I dream once more in youth's glorious bowers,
And no owl is hooting thro' the night.

But, ah! a voice and a fear within
Seem to hint of grief and of crime unknown,
And over my brightness the shadow of sin,
Like a black veil o'er a fair girl, is thrown,
And the owl is hooting thro' the night.

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It comes with a clash, it comes with a storm.
The light and the music fade away,
And far above the phantom-form
Of the witch-like moon walks cold and gray,
And the owl is hooting thro' the night.

I mount, I float on the wings of the wind,
The terror within me, the storm without,
The death before me, the peril behind,
In the driving mist of an endless doubt,
While the owl is hooting thro' the night.

If Love were near, or if Faith's pale star
Shone on the edge of the trembling cloud,
Where the new spring morning burns afar,
I should rise as the dead rise from their shroud.
When the owl is hooting thro' the night.

I should rise all glad with a radiant hope,
I should rise inflamed with passionate song,
And under the Morning's still blue cope,
Feel the love in my heart grow deep and strong,
Tho' the owl is hooting thro' the night.

O, Life, that ever lives in the sky,
That throbs in the star, that flows in the sea,
That still lives on when all things die,
Power, Love or God, live, live in me,
Like music or fragrance or morning light.