Sharp is the night, but stars with frost alive Leap off the rim of earth across the dome. It is a night to make the heavens our home More than the nest whereto apace we strive. Lengths down our road each fir-tree seems a hive, In swarms outrushing from the golden comb. They waken waves of thoughts that burst to foam: The living throb in me, the dead revive. Yon mantle clothes us: there, past mortal breath, Life glistens on the river of the death. It folds us, flesh and dust; and have we knelt, Or never knelt, or eyed as kine the springs Of radiance, the radiance enrings; And this is the soul's haven to have felt. | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE KANSAS EMIGRANTS by JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER THE INTRODUCTION by AL-DHAHABI IN LAMPLIGHT by MARTIN DONISTHORPE ARMSTRONG VERSES TO A FRIEND by BERNARD BARTON STRUCTURAL IRON WORKERS by MACKNIGHT BLACK SICK BED by EDMUND CHARLES BLUNDEN TAKE YOUR CHOICE: AS LONGFELLOW WROTE IT by BERTON BRALEY TOWARDS DEMOCRACY: PART 3. CHRISTMAS EVE by EDWARD CARPENTER |