Between the dusk of a summer night / William Ernest Henley

XXII

Between the dusk of a summer night
     And the dawn of a summer day,
We caught at a mood as it passed in flight,
     And we bade it stop and stay.
And what with the dawn of night began
     With the dusk of day was done;
For that is the way of woman and man,
     When a hazard has made them one.
Arc upon arc, from shade to shine,
     The World went thundering free;
And what was his errand but hers and mine --
     The lords of him, I and she?
O, it's die we must, but it's live we can,
     And the marvel of earth and sun
Is all for the joy of woman and man
     And the longing that makes them one.

~~~
William Ernest Henley (1849-1903)
from Hawthorne and Lavender, 1901

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

William Ernest Henley biography