"Acquainted With The Night"

Edward Thomas's "Out in the Dark" concludes with the following stanza:

How weak and little is the light,
All the universe of sight,
Love and delight,
Before the might,
If you love it not, of night.

Edna Longley (editor), Edward Thomas: The Annotated Collected Poems (Bloodaxe Books 2008).

I suggested in my previous post that "if you love it not" is quintessential Thomas.  It is also one of those phrases that sounds like quintessential Robert Frost.  After Thomas's death, Frost once referred to him as "the only brother I ever had."  There are lines and stanzas -- even entire poems -- that sound as if they could have been written by either of them.

This has to do with the beauty of the words, but it also has to do with the use to which the words are put.  Often, this use entails the sort of wondrous, seemingly out-of-the-blue twist embodied in "if you love it not": a twist that flows back through the entire poem and gives it -- suddenly -- a breadth and depth that can take your breath away.

           Harald Sohlberg, "Winter Night in the Mountains" (1918-1924)

          Acquainted with the Night

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain -- and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-by;
And further still at an unearthly height,
One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.

Robert Frost, West-Running Brook (1928).

Thomas and Frost were both well-acquainted with the night.  Night means darkness -- literally and figuratively; outside and inside.  But, remember: "if you love it not . . ."  

            Harald Sohlberg, "Winter Night in the Mountains" (1911-1914)