Sunset Wings
Edited by Marianne Van Remoortel- Select a Witness
- v1. Athenaeum (London), May 24, 1873
- v2. New York Times (New York, NY), June 8, 1873
- v3. Boston Daily Advertiser (Boston, MA), June 9, 1873
- v4. Bangor Daily Whig & Courier (Bangor, ME), June 12, 1873
- v5. Albion (New York, NY), June 14, 1873
- v6. Springfield Republican (Springfield, MA), June 18, 1873
- v7. Buffalo Daily Courier (Buffalo, NY), June 28, 1873
- v8. Daily Evening Bulletin (San Francisco, CA), June 28, 1873
- v9. Every Saturday (Boston, MA), June 28, 1873
- v10. Massachusetts Ploughman (Boston, MA), June 28, 1873
- v11. Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper (New York, NY), July 5, 1873
- v12. Newport Mercury (Newport, RI), July 5, 1873
- v13. New-Hampshire Patriot (Concord, NH), July 9, 1873
- v14. Youth's Companion (Boston, MA), August 28, 1873
- v15. Independent Statesman (Concord, NH), September 4, 1873
- v16. Morning Oregonian (Portland, OR), March 20, 1898
- v17. Philadelphia Inquirer (Philadelphia, PA), May 23, 1902
- v18. Dallas Morning News (Dallas, TX), June 9, 1902
- v19. Sunday Oregonian (Portland, OR), July 13, 1902
- v20. Yuma Pioneer (Yuma, CO), August 22, 1902
- v21. Kansas City Star (Kansas City, MO), July 5, 1911
- v22. Arizona Republican (Phoenix, AZ), October 25, 1911
- v23. Daily Oklahoman (Oklahoma City, OK), August 19, 1912
- v24. Christian Science Monitor (Boston, MA), April 6, 1916
- v25. Dallas Morning News (Dallas, TX), November 29, 1918
- v26. Christian Science Monitor (Boston, MA), February 23, 1920
- v27. Dallas Morning News (Dallas, TX), March 6, 1920
- v28. Springfield Republican (Springfield, MA), April 28, 1921
- v29. Albany Evening News (Albany, NY), July 19, 1927
- v30. World Herald (Omaha, NE), May 14, 1935
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SUNSET WINGS.
Tonight the sunset spreads two golden wings
Cleaving the western sky;
Winged too with wind it is, and winnowings
Of birds; as if the day's last hour in rings
Of strenuous flight must die.
Sun-steeped in fire, the homeward pinions sway
Above the dovecote tops;
And clouds of starlings, ere they rest with day,
Sink, clamorous like mill-waters, at wild play,
By turns in every copse.
Each tree heart-deep the wringing rout receives—
Save for the whirr within,
You could not tell the starlings from the leaves;
Then one great puff of wings, and the swarm heaves
Away with all its din.
Even thus Hope's hours, in ever-eddying flight,
To many a refuge tend;
With the first light she laughed, and the last light
Glows round her still; who nathless in the night
At length must make an end.
And now the mustering rooks innumerable
Together sail and soar,
While for the day's death-like tolling knell,
Unto the heart they seem to say, Farewell,
No more, farewell, no more!
Is Hope not plumed, as 'twere a fiery dart?
And, oh! thou dying day,
Even as thou goest must she too depart,
And sorrow told such pinions on the heart
As will not fly away?
Dante Gabrielle Rosetti.
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