A mother's eyes sought hers in anxious, tender quest,

Then turned with prayerful light toward western sky,

As though to wrest the secret of the universe

From silver drapery and peeps beyond,

As though one added effort would avail to pierce

The cloaking space, that something must respond.

A something e'en more wonderful than branchlets sprayed

In weird fantastic tire 'gainst heaven's deep;

And lo the mystic blush of evening gently rayed,

Wee cloudlets strayed from mist like flocks of sheep.