The After-Glow

It is a solemn evening, golden-clear-- The Alpine summits flame with rose-lit snow And headlands purpling on wide seas below, And clouds and woods and arid rocks appear Dissolving in the sun's own atmosphere And vast circumference of light, whose slow Transfiguration--glow and after-glow-- Turns twilight earth to a more luminous sphere. Oh heart, I ask, seeing that the orb of day Has sunk below, yet left to sky and sea His glory's spiritual after-shine: I ask if Love, whose sun hath set for thee, May not touch grief with his memorial ray, And lend to loss itself a joy divine?