Nocturne: "In Country Night"

Night music
sweet music of a country night:

rich requiem of heavy perfume
from Madonna lilies mystic-white,
and joyous peals of fairy bells

borne by a faintly-whispering little breeze
that scarcely breathes
across dark-sweeping lawns
guarded by tall poplar grenadiers
who straightly stand in tall solemnity;

the quick and troubled bark of dreaming dogs
awakened,
wont to bay the moon, now hidden;

the rippling wash and flow of hurrying stream
echoing sullen thunder of the rushing river,
river of death, Rakaia Rangatira,
roaring proudly from the mountain pass
where melt the summer snows
coldly pointing beauty to the skies,

whence falls
the still and silent music of the stars
blazing in midnight splendour to their glorious doom.

a.