When, as the garish day is done, <br />Heaven burns with the descended sun, <br />'Tis passing sweet to mark, <br />Amid that flush of crimson light, <br />The new moon's modest bow grow bright, <br />As earth and sky grow dark. <br /> <br />Few are the hearts too cold to feel <br />A thrill of gladness o'er them steal, <br />When first the wandering eye <br />Sees faintly, in the evening blaze, <br />That glimmering curve of tender rays <br />Just planted in the sky. <br /> <br />The sight of that young crescent brings <br />Thoughts of all fair and youthful things <br />The hopes of early years; <br />And childhood's purity and grace, <br />And joys that like a rainbow chase <br />The passing shower of tears. <br /> <br />The captive yields him to the dream <br />Of freedom, when that virgin beam <br />Comes out upon the air: <br />And painfully the sick man tries <br />To fix his dim and burning eyes <br />On the soft promise there. <br /> <br />Most welcome to the lover's sight, <br />Glitters that pure, emerging light; <br />For prattling poets say, <br />That sweetest is the lovers' walk, <br />And tenderest is their murmured talk, <br />Beneath its gentle ray. <br /> <br />And there do graver men behold <br />A type of errors, loved of old, <br />Forsaken and forgiven; <br />And thoughts and wishes not of earth, <br />Just opening in their early birth, <br />Like that new light in heaven.<br /><br />William Cullen Bryant<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-new-moon-6/