Poem: ‘A Starry Night’

No moon is there, the sky is clear,

no moisture fogs the atmosphere.

Starlight falls on soft white snow,

to mark the path on which I go.

The night is cold, the air quite crisp,

of wind in the cedars there’s not a wisp.

Powdered in white is each limestone ledge,

as I wend my way to water’s edge.

In the hush of night I contemplate

the placid state of the darkened strait,

as crystals of ice begin to lay

a film so slight across our bay.

The sights of summer have long since fled.

Tourists’ trappings the strait has shed.

No lights of pleasure boats ride the waves;

they all hibernate in man-made caves.

Across the strait Plum Island’s red beacon

reigns over its charge of channel buoys blinking.

From Washington Island come faint flashes of white,

where Boyers Bluff light persists in its peeking.

Beneath the twinkling dome that spans the sky,

Death’s Door night watchmen their duties ply,

and homage pay, with wakeful eye and flecks of light,

to the majestic sight of a starry night.

Elmer and Ann Lewis divide their time between Gills Rock and Evanston, Illinois where he is Professor Emeritus of Mechanical Engineering at Northwestern University.