Verses (Baughan)/A March Evening
A MARCH EVENING
The night steals down upon the sea,
Mystery unto mystery.
So late? And we are due at home,
Rover, ere night be fully come!
Whew! Bitter blows the wind and shrill,
As we turn inland, up the hill
With its one cottage—snug, no doubt,
Inside, but grim and grey without;
Save where yon line of light shoots thro’
The good green shutter, half-pull’d to
On father’s meal and tiny prayers
Said in the warmth to-night downstairs;
God bless them!
Ay, but does she wait,
Quit fire and lamp, and sigh, “He’s late!”
To the cold pane? Come on, lad!
Here
Glimmers our path, still vaguely clear,
The little rutted chalky way
That none, I’ll warrant, all the day
Has trod, save us. On either hand
The dim, pathetic downs expand,—
Patches of wan and whiten’d green,
Or purple where the plough has been,
And tawny hillocks. Not a sound,
Save, somewhere rustling near the ground,
A homeward lark; and, far behind,
A great voice vanquishing the wind—
The Sea’s.
All else is near asleep,
No daring star makes shift to peep
Twixt these wild massy clouds that fly
So fast along the pallid sky.
Only the lighthouse beacon streams
Athwart the night in two bright beams
That lonelier make the dark.
Ah—hush!
What moved? What’s all that sudden rush
Of something white—can those be lambs?
They glimmer ’mid their scarce-seen dams
Like baby-ghosts. . . . And now a warm
Sweet whiff of hay . . . the half-way farm
Must be at hand; but where’s the light?
Ah, there. . . . And now ’tis past. The night
Is on us. The black world around
Lies steep’d in loneliness profound.
We plod a mile, and do not speak.
. . . A stinging scud of rain! And bleak
And bleaker comes the wind, with whirls
That choke one, and wild whoops and skirls
Worrying one mad. . . . How foolish! Yet
You, too, begin to whine and fret,
Rover! What is it? Just the storm?
Or can you scent some fiendish form
Prowling ahead? Get on! you slink
Too close. Now, were we near the brink
Instead of safe inland . . . What! Hark! . . .
One’s ear is dull’d by all this dark. . . .
Can that be—surf? . . .
. . . The night so black—
The cliff-track for the homeward-track—
Death in the dark, and no farewell—
My God! . . .
Look! look! the hideous spell
Breaks! Ay, lad, bark and run! All’s past!
Home and the lodestar face at last,
The lifted lamp, the door held wide;
“My dearest!” and the night’s outside!