War Drums (Scharkie)/Night

by Louis Edward Scharkie

NIGHT.

Oft have I thought of the dead at sea
  In their sea-graves lonely,
When the night is black with flying rack,
  And wild winds only;
When the plover cries lone on the windy moor,
  With its mournful complaining;
And wet pines wail to the ghostly gale,
  That is heavy with raining.

Oft have I thought of the dead at sea
  In their sea-graves sleeping,
When the sea-bell's clang, like a death-knell rang,
  Or wild winds weeping.
When the gale, flying wild thro' the sable night,
  Rode high on the surges;
And death was abroad, and sea-fiends roared
  Aloud with their dirges.

Yet night! there are brighter reflections of thee
  Than death, and sea-moanings,
That are heard in the blast when 'tis hurrying past
  With its thunders and groanings.
When thou foldest the day, like a tired child,
  In his drap'ry of twilight,
The sense of a balm creeps cool thro' the calm
  That thou shed'st in the skylight.

O'er the tops of the hills, fringing dorsum and peak
  With a hyaline halo,
The moon, like a queen, over realms serene,
  Rises ambient and fallow.
And the sea, dimpled o'er with her trampling beams,
  Shoots shimmer and glister;
And leaves, where the breeze leaps aloft in the trees,
  Awaken, and whisper.

And thy sister is sleep; and she comes from the stars,
  And over the valleys;
And the world, soothed of cares, sinks low at its prayers,
  'Mid a silence that hallows
And the sighings of love, and the burdens of time,
  And toil that distresses,
Are swayed in her arms, while she pillows and charms,
  And smoothes, and caresses.

Then the morn grows gray thro' deeper air;
  On purple, high places;
And thou and thy stars, 'neath morning's gold bars,
  Have hidden your faces.
And the song of the flowers, commingled with mine,
  Follows thee to the highlight,
Where thou closest to sleep, like the moon from the deep,
  On the lap of the twilight.