The Day is Done by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
As darkness falls, the speaker sees village lights through rain and mist and feels sadness and longing. Seeking rest from the day's cares, the speaker asks someone to read aloud a heartfelt poem by a humbler poet, preferring its comfort to the grand masters' reminders of toil. The speaker anticipates that the reading will quiet these cares.
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow · Genre: Lyric Poetry, Metapoetry · 392 words
First lines
The day is done, and the darkness / Falls from the wings of Night, / As a feather is wafted downward / From an eagle in his flight.
I see the lights of the village / Gleam through the rain and the mist, / And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me / That my soul cannot resist:
Genres
- Lyric Poetry — The first-person speaker expresses evening sadness and a desire for rest in rhymed four-line stanzas.
- Metapoetry — The speaker distinguishes grand, demanding verse from heartfelt songs and asks for poetry whose words and spoken delivery can quiet care.
Tags
evening · sadness · longing · reading aloud · consolation · rest
What this Textopian page supports
The Day is Done is listed on Textopian as a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, dated Date unknown.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Poem
- Author: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- Date: Date unknown
- Language: English
- Genres: Lyric Poetry, Metapoetry
- Length: 392 words
- Structure: 1 section, 11 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Standard (8th-9th Grade)
Good citation fit
- Work identity for The Day is Done by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
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