One hot and sultry summer night,
While the trees outside stood dark and still,
I tried to get my checkbook right,
At the desk beside my window sill.

One thing moved in the heat and damp,
The whispering of a hundred moths,
Trapped around the backyard lamp.
In pity, I went and turned it off.

They flew away and left me there,
Wishing that something, likewise, might
Free me from the musty air
That gathered around my dim desk light.

My old brass wind-harp, long un-tongued,
Gave forth a single, clarion chime,
From where it had, untroubled, hung.
A neighbor’s porch gave answering rhyme.

I turned to see the heat-lights leap
Between the towering thunderheads,
Which had gathered in the upper deep,
While I nodded, working, half asleep.