I

To-night he sees their star bead, dewy bright, Deep in the pansy, eve hath made for it, Low in the west--a placid purple lit At its far edge with warm auroral light: Love's planet hangs above a cedared height; And there in shadow, like gold music writ Of dusk's dark fingers, scale-like fireflies flit Now up, now down the balmy bars of night. How different from that eve a year ago! Which was a stormy flower in the hair Of dolorous day, whose sombre eyes looked blurred Into night's sibyl face, and saw the woe Of parting here, and imaged a despair, As now a hope caught from a homing word.