Friday, August 16, 2013

FOR A LITTLE WHILE

                                                The Day is Done

THE DAY is done, and the darkness 
  Falls from the wings of Night, 
As a feather is wafted downward 
  From an eagle in his flight. 
  
I see the lights of the village         5
  Gleam through the rain and the mist, 
And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me 
  That my soul cannot resist: 
  
A feeling of sadness and longing, 
  That is not akin to pain,  10
And resembles sorrow only 
  As the mist resembles the rain. 
  
Come, read to me some poem, 
  Some simple and heartfelt lay, 
That shall soothe this restless feeling,  15
  And banish the thoughts of day. 
  
Not from the grand old masters, 
  Not from the bards sublime, 
Whose distant footsteps echo 
  Through the corridors of Time.  20
  
For, like strains of martial music, 
  Their mighty thoughts suggest 
Life's endless toil and endeavor; 
  And to-night I long for rest. 
  
Read from some humbler poet,  25
  Whose songs gushed from his heart, 
As showers from the clouds of summer, 
  Or tears from the eyelids start; 
  
Who, through long days of labor, 
  And nights devoid of ease,  30
Still heard in his soul the music 
  Of wonderful melodies. 
  
Such songs have power to quiet 
  The restless pulse of care, 
And come like the benediction  35
  That follows after prayer. 
  
Then read from the treasured volume 
  The poem of thy choice, 
And lend to the rhyme of the poet 
  The beauty of thy voice.  40
  
And the night shall be filled with music, 
  And the cares, that infest the day, 
Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs, 
  And as silently steal away.

                                                              - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

3 comments:

Anne Bonney said...

Amen

Buck said...

And lend to the rhyme of the poet
The beauty of thy voice.


You pluck my heartstrings. The ex- used to read poetry to me regularly. I miss that.

HMS Defiant said...

I like evocative and poetry is up there with remembered scents in finding a way to cascade memory.