Night - Duncan Campbell Scott

The night is old, and all the world
    Is wearied out with strife;
A long gray mist lies heavy and wan
    Above the house of life.

Four stars burn up and are unquelled
    By the low, shrunken moon;
Her spirit draws her down and down—
    She shall be buried soon.

There is a sound that is no sound,
    Yet fine it falls and clear,
The whisper of the spinning earth
    To the tranced atmosphere.

An odour lives where once was air,
    A strange, unearthly scent,
From the burning of the four great stars
    Within the firmament.

The universe, deathless and old,
    Breathes, yet is void of breath:
As still as death that seems to move
    And yet is still as death.

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Duncan Campbell Scott (1862 - 1947) Canada
Source: AllPoetry