Poem by Henry Van Dyke

A Noon Song

There are songs for the morning and songs for the night, 
For sunrise and sunset, the stars and the moon; 
But who will give praise to the fulness of light, 
And sing us a song of the glory of noon? 
Oh, the high noon, the clear noon, 
The noon with golden crest; 
When the blue sky burns, and the great sun turns 
With his face to the way of the west! 

How swiftly he rose in the dawn of his strength; 
How slowly he crept as the morning wore by; 
Ah, steep was the climbing that led him at length 
To the height of his throne in the wide summer sky. 
Oh, the long toil, the slow toil, 
The toil that may not rest, 
Till the sun looks down from his journey’s crown, 
To the wonderful way of the west! 

Then a quietness falls over meadow and hill, 
The wings of the wind in the forest are furled, 
The river runs softly, the birds are all still, 
The workers are resting all over the world. 
Oh, the good hour, the kind hour, 
The hour that calms the breast! 
Little inn half-way on the road of the day, 
Where it follows the turn to the west! 

There’s a plentiful feast in the maple-tree shade, 
The lilt of a song to an old-fashioned tune, 
The talk of a friend, or the kiss of a maid, 
To sweeten the cup that we drink to the noon. 
Oh, the deep noon, the full noon, 
Of all the day the best! 
When the blue sky burns, and the great sun turns 
To his home by the way of the west.

1. The Wind of Sorrow
2. War-Music
3. Nepenthe
4. The Ancestral Dwelling
5. The Heavenly Hills of Holland

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