The Wood Thrush at Eve

AT the wood edge, what time the sun sank low,
We lingered speechless, being loath to leave
The cool, the calm, the quiet touch of eve,
And all the glamour of the afterglow.
We watched the purple shadows lengthen slow,
Saw the swift swallows through the clear air cleave,
And bats begin their wayward flight to weave,
Then rose reluctantly, and turned to go.

But ere we won beyond the warder trees,
From out the dim deep copse that hid the swale
Welled of a sudden flutelike harmonies
Flooding the twilight, scale on silvery scale,
As though we heard, far o’er the sundering seas,
The pain and passion of the nightingale.