Rupert Brooke (1887–1915). Collected Poems. 1916.
I. 190519082. Day That I Have Loved
T
And smooth your quiet brow, and fold your thin dead hands.
The grey veils of the half-light deepen; colour dies.
I bear you, a light burden, to the shrouded sands,
Mist-garlanded, with all grey weeds of the water crowned. There you’ll be laid, past fear of sleep or hope of waking; And over the unmoving sea, without a sound, Us with stretched arms and empty eyes on the fargleaming And marble sand.… Beyond the shifting cold twilight, Further than laughter goes, or tears, further than dreaming, There’ll be no port, no dawn-lit islands! But the drear Waste darkening, and, at length, flame ultimate on the deep. Oh, the last fire—and you, unkissed, unfriended there! Oh, the lone way’s red ending, and we not there to weep! Lovely and secret as a child. You came with us, Come happily, hand in hand with the young dancing hours, High on the downs at dawn!) Void now and tenebrous, Fragrant of June and clover, floats the dark, and fills The hollow sea’s dead face with little creeping shadows, And the white silence brims the hollow of the hills. Hushed all the joyful voices; and we, who held you dear, Eastward we turn and homeward, alone, remembering… Day that I loved, day that I loved, the Night is here!