Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, NIGHTFALL ON THE LYNNHAVEN, by MARY SINTON LEITCH


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

NIGHTFALL ON THE LYNNHAVEN, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: I love lynnhaven river at this hour
Last Line: Slowly to darkness and oblivion.
Subject(s): Night; Rivers; Shadows; Bedtime


I love Lynnhaven river at this hour
Of dusk when streams are clearest; when the night,
Though tenderly concealing tree and flower,
Yet fills the water with translucent light.

The river shadows seem to take no more
Their being from the pines and willow trees
But, losing kinship with the darkening shore,
They turn to vague, enshrouded mysteries; --

Dim, muffled shapes -- belonging to a past
That might have been -- of yearning or despair;
Poor restless ghosts that now have found at last
Their rest, their peace, in that deep silence there.

Among the river reeds the solemn choirs
Of darkness sound, but in the tranquil stream
Are huddled still those wraiths of dead desires,
Those phantoms of illusion and of dream.

And now their wistful, shadowy hands are laid
In ghostly summons on me one by one,
Until with them my spirit seems to fade
Slowly to darkness and oblivion.





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