The Nightingale at Great Barr

by John Kilbourn

The sun is chambered in the distant west,
And night has spread her robes across the sky;
Nature is silent in expectancy,
And over all things lies the hush of rest.

The stars above their faithful sentry keep;
I listen for the music of the spheres,
Said to re-echo through the eternal years,
But every earthly sound and whisper sleep.

But hark! From out of the shadows comes a song,
So strangely sweet, that never was there wrought
such music out of human life or thought,
Nor earth's darkness do such notes belong.

The song is heard; the singer hides from sight;
Hath not God promised music in the night?