A Night in June / Madison Cawein

A Night in June

I

White as a lily moulded of Earth's milk
    That eve the moon bloomed in a hyacinth sky;
    Soft in the gleaming glens the wind went by,
Faint as a phantom clothed in unseen silk:
Bright as a naiad's leap, from shine to shade
    The runnel twinkled through the shaken brier;
    Above the hills one long cloud, pulsed with fire,
Flashed like a great enchantment-welded blade.
And when the western sky seemed some weird land,
    And night a witching spell at whose command
    One sloping star fell green from heav'n; and deep
The warm rose opened for the moth to sleep;
    Then she, consenting, laid her hands in his,
    And lifted up her lips for their first kiss.


II

There where they part, the porch's steps are strewn
    With wind-blown petals of the purple vine;
    Athwart the porch the shadow of a pine
Cleaves the white moonlight; and like some calm rune
Heaven says to Earth, shines the majestic moon;
    And now a meteor draws a lilac line
    Across the welkin, as if God would sign
The perfect poem of this night of June.
The wood-wind stirs the flowering chestnut-tree,
    Whose curving blossoms strew the glimmering grass
    Like crescents that wind-wrinkled waters glass;
And, like a moonstone in a frill of flame,
    The dewdrop trembles on the peony,
    As in a lover's heart his sweetheart's name.

~~

Madison Cawein (1865-1914)
from Kentucky Poems, 1903

[Poem is in the public domain worldwide]

Madison Cawein biography