Before Dawn Poem by Radclyffe Hall

Malvern


I rose, ere yet the eager light
Had wrested from the grasp of night
The trembling spirit of the world.
The dusk of dawn with wistful eyes
Stole timidly across the skies,
A little cloud its edges curled
By passing winds sped soft and bright
Towards some Eastern Paradise.

No bird was yet awake to sing,
And silence kissing everything
Compelled my doubting soul to rest.
While yet I slept a fall of snow
Had whitened all the hills, and lo!
Above the nearest summit's crest,
A pendent star, as though to bring
God's blessing to His Earth below,
Shone like a thought benign, and kind,
Within the vast Eternal Mind.