THE moon shines full, the elm-trees stand Like sentinels, and shadows spill, And up that quiet, unearthly land The sheepbells with their tinkling fill A silence reaching to the sky; The rounded farm-stacks that were gold Now moon-lit and unreal lie; And all is magical and cold. But here, beneath my window, one Magnolia flower blooms, alight, Moon-glinted, lovely, and alone, As fastened in the hair of night, And from it to my nostrils creep Such spicy odours as might move To raptured waking all who sleep, The very moon herself, to love. So may night breathe in beauty, when My little flame blows out, and I Back to the fold return, for then It will be dream-like, and goodbye Will not be harder than it must; For life will leave me with a kiss Upon my brow of moonlit dust -- If night be beautiful like this! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ANTIQUITY OF FREEDOM by WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT HER FIRST-BORN by CHARLES TENNYSON TURNER ODES: BOOK 1: ODE 12. TO SIR FRANCIS HENRY DRAKE, BARONET by MARK AKENSIDE TO ANACREON by ANTIPATER OF SIDON TURNED OUT FOR RENT by M. L. S. BURKE THE FOREGOING CRITICISM, IN ENGLISH VERSE by JOHN BYROM THE TRYST OF THE NIGHT by MAY (MARY) CLARISSA GILLINGTON BYRON |