Xxix

This fair garden flowering to flame, That seems the wondrous beauty to proclaim Of that clear garden whereunto we cleave, Is crystallised in frosted gold this eve. A great white silence drops athwart the sky, Out there where gleams a marble hue, Whither, one by one, the tall trees stride, Each with its shadow, long and blue And lonely, by its side. No stir of wind; but soundlessly The blanched veils of cold alone Unfold themselves mysteriously On the marshes' silver or the roads' white stone. The stars are lustrous with desire; Like furbished steel the rime Within the cold, translucid air. From some infinity sublime, Across the paleness of a waning moon, Falls shower on shower of fire-- Star-dust that there Sinks in a scintillating swoon. It is the hour divine, when wistfully A million eyes look down upon the earth-- Upon the hazards of our human birth-- From out immutable eternity.