| Higginson and Bigelow, comps. American Sonnets. 1891. | | | | Two Phases | | By Edgar Fawcett (1847–1904) |
| | | I SAW the immense moon rise beyond a sweep | |
| Of shadowy sea whose waves were softly curled; | |
| I watched the reddening splendor she unfurled | |
| By dreamy and rich gradations landward creep. | |
| Dark pines that fluttering breezes roused from sleep, | 5 |
| Long meadows where the illumined dew lay pearled, | |
| The expectant air, the vast encircling world, | |
| All thrilled with eagerness divinely deep! | |
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| Days afterward I roamed that same fair shore; | |
| Bright surges broke on rocks with mellow roar; | 10 |
| Both earth and ocean laughed with golden noon. | |
| But faintly, in opal distances of sky, | |
| Like a bowed shape that crawls away to die | |
| Where none shall heed, I saw the old withered moon! | | | | |
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