"Dawn"


"Dawn"

The soft-toned clock upon the stair chimed three―
            Too sweet for sleep, too early yet to rise.
            In restful peace I lay with half-closed eyes,
Watching the tender hours go dreamily;
The tide was flowing in; I heard the sea
            Shivering along the sands; while yet the skies
            Were dim, uncertain, as the light that lies
Beneath the fretwork of some wild-rose tree
Within the thicket gray. The chanticleer
            Sent drowsy calls across the slumberous air;
            In solemn silence sweet it was to hear
My own heart beat. . . . Then broad and deep and fair―
            Trembling in its new birth from heaven’s womb―
            One crimson shaft of dawn sank thro’ my room.



This poem reprinted as "Dawn on Puget Sound" in Overland Monthly's April 1890 edition, vol. 15 page 422.


"Dawn" as it appears in Ella Higginson's When the Birds Go North Again (1898).


"Dawn" as it appears in Ella Higginson's The Voice of April-Land (1903).

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