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Ancestral

The star dissolved in evening—the one star
The silently
                  and night O soon now, soon
And still the light now
                                   and still now the large
Relinquishing
                    and through the pools of blue
Still, still the swallows
                                      and a wind now
                                                           and the tree
Gathering darkness:
                             I was small. I lay
Beside my mother on the grass, and sleep
Came—
 
         slow hooves and dripping with the dark
The velvet muzzles, the white feet that move
In a dream water
                       and O soon now soon
Sleep and the night.
 
                             And I was not afraid.
Her hand lay over mine. Her fingers knew
Darkness,—and sleep—the silent lands, the far
Far off of morning where I should awake.
Other works by Archibald MacLeish...



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