The Earth Turns South/Black Night

by Clement Richardson Wood

BLACK NIGHT

O somber, sorrowful black night,
You rise, a bleak and solitary mourner
Over the blackened hills;
And all night long, from your cloud-hooded star-gold eyes,
Lonely star-golden tears.
Creep down your somber cheek
To nothingness.

You mourn for much:
For a chill, stiffened baby,
Heavy at its mother's bosom. . . .
For a young woman's stilled face,
Eyeless and tongueless forever. . . .
For a reckless, blundering youth,
Sun gold pelting in his veins,
And spilling on the red-stained dust,
As the shrouding smoke drifts,
And the stabbing gas scatters on. . . .
For twitching battlefields. . . .

For Jesus dead, and his clean words
Wounded almost to death. . . .
For gentle Lincoln dead,
And all day's shining sons
Hunched forward frozenly,
Each on his lone cross. . . .
For laughter stabbed, and rapture gassed,
And joy and love reviled, defiled,
Each on his lone cross. . . .
O sorrowing, somber black night,
You mourn all these . . . and more.

All night long, from your cloud-hooded star-gold eyes,
Lonely star-golden tears
Creep down your somber cheek
To nothingness.
You pass, a bleak and solitary mourner,
Beyond the blackened hills,
As day comes on.