Walter Murdoch (1874–1970). The Oxford Book of Australasian Verse. 1918.

53. Night

BURNING our hearts out with longing

The daylight passed:

Millions and millions together,

The stars at last!

Purple the woods where the dewdrops,

Pearly and grey,

Wash in the cool from our faces

The flame of day.

Glory and shadow grow one in

The hazel wood:

Laughter and peace in the stillness

Together brood.

Hopes all unearthly are thronging

In hearts of earth:

Tongues of the starlight are calling

Our souls to birth.

Down from the heaven its secrets

Drop one by one;

Where time is for ever beginning

And time is done.

There light eternal is over

Chaos and night:

Singing with dawn lips for ever,

“Let there be light!”

There too for ever in twilight

Time slips away,

Closing in darkness and rapture

Its awful day.