Below The Sunset’s Range Of Rose

Below the sunset's range of rose, Below the heaven's deepening blue, Down woodways where the balsam blows, And milkweed tufts hang, gray with dew, A Jersey heifer stops and lows- The cows come home by one, by two. There is no star yet: but the smell Of hay and pennyroyal mix With herb aromas of the dell, Where the root-hidden cricket clicks: Among the ironweeds a bell Clangs near the rail-fenced clover-ricks. She waits upon the slope beside The windlassed well the plum trees shade, The well curb that the goose-plums hide; Her light hand on the bucket laid, Unbonneted she waits, glad-eyed, Her gown as simple as her braid. She sees fawn-colored backs among The sumacs now; a tossing horn Its clashing bell of copper rung: Long shadows lean upon the corn, And slow the day dies, scarlet stung, The cloud in it a rosy thorn. Below the pleasant moon, that tips The tree tops of the hillside, fly The flitting bats; the twilight slips, In firefly spangles, twinkling by, Through which he comes: Their happy lips Meet-and one star leaps in the sky. He takes her bucket, and they speak Of married hopes while in the grass The plum drops glowing as her cheek; The patient cows look back or pass: And in the west one golden streak Burns as if God gazed through a glass.