Night

Slowly the night fans out
    A peacock-tail of stars,
Green into blue between
    The eyes of Venus and Mars.

Slowly the sky comes clear,
    Speech with its disturbance
And all the rustling of paper
    Falling towards silence.

Time is for the day -
    Time is, time was, time's past.
But the night is timeless:
    Nothing first, nothing last,

Preening the same black feather
    Out of her raven wing.
And her jewels are like the sea,
    Seething, endlessly soothing,

With a gold phosphorescence
...