As sunlight will expand a rose.
And after the story of the sunset we have the story of the song:
One day he heard a singing strain—
A human voice, in bird-like trills,
He paused, and little rapture-rills
Went trickling downward through each vein.
And then the years went by. Queen Folly held her sway. She fed his flesh and drugged his mind; he trailed his glory in the mire. And, after a long interval, he revisited his boyhood's home, beheld another sunset and heard another song:
The clouds made day a gorgeous bed;
He saw the splendor of the sky
With unmoved heart and stolid eye;