Sunset

The autumn evening dies, and all the west Is warm soft gold to half the heaven’s height: And in the silent air I float and rest On waters that are lovers of the light.

The clear curved dome of the Redeemer’s Church Is black against the yellow arch of sky; And purple-peaked within the sunset’s porch, The Euganean hills like islands lie—

Children of Padua, but to Venice friends! Who that has seen them in the evening hour, But has forgotten earthly cares and ends, All things but Love that never loses power;

And from St. George among the Seaweed, set A sapphire isle in golden waters, down To the Armenian Convent where the fret Of the sea winds has turned the cypress brown,

The spacious waters in full tide are spread, A lustrous cloth of gold with colours splashed;— Blue liquid belts and mirrored clouds blood-red, Green blazing sea-marsh, broidered waves that flashed

Now ebony, now scarlet, when the tide, Smoothing the ripple on the shallow’s rim, Flowed strong to southward where, in towered pride, Islanded Venice sang her evening hymn.

How calm, how passionless, how golden-fair! Beauty, I thought, stood tiptoe on his height— When down the near canal, and tossed in air, Two lofty sails moved slow athwart the light;

And their tall masts and soaring booms aslope, Were sky-companions of the lonely dome, That on Giudecca bids the sinner hope, And seen from Malamocco speaks of home.

The moving sails, the thought of ocean’s life, The sense of human will within the ship, Enriched the peace with which they seemed at strife, And filled the cup of Beauty to the lip.

O thou, who wast beside me when we loved This vision of the evening and the sea; Why art thou silent, why so far removed? Implore of Death, ask God to set thee free.