The Complete Poems of Emily Brontë, The battle had passed from the height

VIII

The battle had passed from the height,
And still did evening fall;
While heaven with its restful night
Gloriously canopied all.

The dead around were sleeping
On heath and granite grey,
And the dying their last watch were keeping
In the closing of the day.

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How golden bright from earth and heaven
The summer day declines!
How gloriously o'er land and sea
The parting sunbeam shines!
There is a voice in the wind that waves
Those bright rejoicing trees.

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Not a vapour had stained the breezeless blue,
Not a cloud had dimmed the sun,
From the time of morning's earliest dew
Till the summer day was done.

And all as pure and all as bright
The sun of evening died,
And purer still its parting light
Shone on Lake Elnor's tide.

Waveless and calm lies that silent deep
In its wilderness of moors,
Solemn and soft the moonbeams sleep
Upon its heathy shores.

The deer are gathered to their rest,
The wild sheep seek the fold.

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Only some spires of bright green grass
Transparently in sunshine quivering.

The sun has set, and the long grass now
Waves dreamily in the evening wind;
And the wild bird has flown from that old grey stone,
In some warm nook a couch to find.

In all the lonely landscape round
I see no light and hear no sound,
Except the wind that far away
Comes sighing o'er the healthy sea.

Lady, in thy palace hall,
Once perchance thy face was seen;
Can no memory now recall
Thought again to what has been?

August 1837.

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