Observations placeholder

THE FRIENDLY LAMP

The clouds that bear upon their wings
the rain
Turn homeward now toward the mountain-tops ;
And on the maple leaves I hear again
The first few large and hesitating drops.

Evening is nigh. The noises change or
cease.
There is no time for philosophic
thought
So dear to me as when I muse at peace
In cool dark silence undisturbed of
aught.

Star-like among the many branching
leaves
Flicker the fireflies on their golden
wings :
The windbell, dangling from the carven
eaves,
" Chirin " and " chirin," "chirin, chirin"
sings.

I have been happy, brooding here apart,-
Nay, I have learned how sorrow comes,
indeed,

Of nothing but a man's insatiate heart;
But now night falls.  I will go up and
read.

And just as though it called me in to
bend
Over my volumes now that night
returns,
My lamp, like some old sympathetic
friend,

There at the paper window waits and burns.