Poems (Henley)/In the placid summer midnight

by William Ernest Henley

XXVI

In the placid summer midnight, Under the drowsy sky,I seem to hear in the stillness The moths go glimmering by.

One by one from the windows The lights have all been sped.Never a blind looks conscious— The street is asleep in bed!

But I come where a living casement Laughs luminous and wide;I hear the song of a piano Break in a sparkling tide;

And I feel, in the waltz that frolics And warbles swift and clear,A sudden sense of shelter And friendliness and cheer . . .

A sense of tinkling glasses, Of love and laughter and light—The piano stops, and the window Stares blank out into the night.

The blind goes out, and I wander To the old, unfriendly sea,The lonelier for the memory That walks like a ghost with me.