Wingate sat in his room at night Between the moon and the candlelight, Reading his Byron with knitted brows, While his mind drank in the peace of his house, It was long past twelve, and the night was deep With moonlight and silence and wind and sleep, And the small, dim noises, thousand-fold, That all old houses and forests hold. The boards that creak for nothing at all, The leaf that rustles, the bough that sighs, The nibble of mice in the wainscot-wall, And the slow clock ticking the time that dies All distilled in a single sound Like a giant breathing underground, A sound more sleepy than sleep itself. Wingate put his book on the shelf And went to the window. It was good To walk in the ghost through a silver wood And set one’s mettle against the far Bayonet-point of the fixed North Star. He stood there a moment, wondering. North Star, wasp with the silver sting Blue-nosed star on the Yankee banners, We are coming against you to teach you manners!