Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE LIGHT OF DAYS GONE BY, by ALICE CARY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE LIGHT OF DAYS GONE BY, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Some comfort when all else is night
Last Line: In the light of days gone by.
Subject(s): Past


SOME comfort when all else is night,
About his fortune plays,
Who sets his dark to-days in the light
Of the sunnier yesterdays.

In memory of joy that's been
Something of joy is, still;
Where no dew is, we may dabble in
A dream of the dew at will.

All with the dusty city's throng
Walled round, I mused to-day
Of flowery sheets lying white along
The pleasant grass of the way.

Under the hedge by the brawling brook
I heard the woodpecker's tap.
And the drunken trills of the blackbirds shook
The sassafras leaves in my lap.

I thought of the rainy morning air
Dropping down through the pine,
Of furrows fresh from the shining share,
And smelling sweeter than wine.

Of the soft, thick moss, and how it grew
With silver beads impearled,
In the well that we used to think ran through
To the other side of the world.

I thought of the old barn set about
With its stacks of sweet, dry hay;
Of the swallows flying in and out
Through the gables, steep and gray;

Thought of the golden hum of the bees,
Of the cocks with their heads so high,
Making it morn in the tops of the trees
Before it was morn in the sky.

And of the home, of the dear old home,
With its brown and rose-bound wall,
Where we fancied death could never come --
I thought of it more than of all.

Each childish play-ground memory claims,
Telling me here, and thus,
We called to the echoes by their names,
Till we made them answer us.

Thank God, when other power decays,
And other pleasures die,
We still may set our dark to-days
In the light of days gone by.





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