Death & Dying

The Night Cometh

by John McCrae 1872–1918

From In Flanders Fields and Other Poems (1919)

Death & DyingReligion

Cometh the night. The wind falls low,
The trees swing slowly to and fro:
Around the church the headstones grey
Cluster, like children strayed away
But found again, and folded so.

No chiding look doth she bestow:
If she is glad, they cannot know;
If ill or well they spend their day,
Cometh the night.

Singing or sad, intent they go;
They do not see the shadows grow;
"There yet is time," they lightly say,
"Before our work aside we lay";
Their task is but half-done, and lo!
Cometh the night.

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'Cometh the night.' A churchyard at dusk, with headstones clustered like strayed children, and the workers who lie there have tasks that are 'but half-done'.

MLA

McCrae, John. “The Night Cometh.” Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/mccrae/9/.

Chicago

McCrae, John. “The Night Cometh.” Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/mccrae/9/.

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