I Know it's Not Friday...

... but who declared Friday to be poetry day, anyway? Given that reflecting on this poem for the past couple of days was what tipped my hand this morning when the vet was here, thought I'd post it for all to read. The vet was out to do the normal prenatal check-up for my mare, but while he was here, I asked him to have a look at poor, ancient Emma (40, if she was a day) to see whether he agreed that it was time to Let Evening Come. And, indeed, it was. Emma left us while peacefully chewing a mouthful of grass up in the field, her favourite place of all.

Let Evening Come
Let the light of late afternoon
shine through chinks in the barn, moving
up the bales as the sun moves down.

Let the cricket take up chafing
as a woman takes up her needles
and her yarn. Let evening come.

Let dew collect on the hoe abandoned
in long grass. Let the stars appear
and the moon disclose her silver horn.

Let the fox go back to its sandy den.
Let the wind die down. Let the shed
go black inside. Let evening come.

To the bottle in the ditch, to the scoop
in the oats, to air in the lung
let evening come.

Let it come, as it will, and don't
be afraid. God does not leave us
comfortless, so let evening come.

Jane Kenyon (1947-1995)