End of Hot Day

END OF HOT DAY

Midsummer Georgica NSW

End of hot day. Fierce sun has vanished now.

Yet still bright twilight lights west-lying cloud-

Forms spreading yellow-greying in pale vastness.

Are they the heralds of new rain in darkness?

A final butterfly of day flits by,

Above the seed-tipped grasses, summer-high.

Black crows flap towards the heights of night-safe trees,

Soft-rustling topmost leaves in slightest breeze.

Now eastern hills are briefly tinged with gold-

The Midas touch of day's last-passing role.

Above them crescent moon is growing bright

In sky that's fading towards the rise of night.

The heat is falling and the world's inclined

To pass into the shadow side of time

Where stars will show the darker, cooling hours,

Bring some retreat from blaze of solar power.

And in the cooling darkening of sight,

I ponder in the passing to the night

How storms and rains have saved the summer here

From drought's despair and greater fire-fear.

How long will fortune's blessing last? How long?

I hear of terror, fire-born, beyond

The scant horizon of my turning days-

Devouring, roaring flames, the deadly blaze.

I hear of fiercer storms with fury from

The trapping of the energy from sun;

As change, without a harbour or a haven,

Becomes our sadness like a war from heaven.