Farm on a Summer Night

From a clear sky at night the starlight
          flows down to the earth
And out from the eaves of the houses
          go prayers motioned skyward, 
For better or worse the body resigns
          to the dream,
The work-tired the care-worn sigh
          softly an amen, their safe word.

And peace gropes over the valley
          to touch with blundering fingers
The wrinkled brow of the plowland,
          the cattle carved on the meadow,
The farmer bound to his wife where the
          ashes of beauty still smolder,
The children, the lovers, the old people
          wandering in shadow.

The starlight flows down to the earth
          and the prayers ascend skyward,
The cry of the earth rises up to be
          endlessly answered
By these bright shafts of starlight
          forever down raining
As drowsy folk turn in their beds
          and by sleep are swift lancered.