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Lyric Poem · Nature

The Evening Star

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Lo! in the painted oriel of the West,

Whose panes the sunken sun incarnadines,

Like a fair lady at her casement, shines

The evening star, the star of love and rest!

And then anon she doth herself divest

Of all her radiant garments, and reclines

Behind the sombre screen of yonder pines,

With slumber and soft dreams of love oppressed.

O my beloved, my sweet Hesperus!

My morning and my evening star of love!

My best and gentlest lady! even thus,

As that fair planet in the sky above,

Dost thou retire unto thy rest at night,

And from thy darkened window fades the light.

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Quick facts

Poem
The Evening Star
Poet
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Length
14 lines
Form
Lyric Poem
Themes
Nature, Love, Dreams & Sleep

Craft notes

How this poem works

Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.

Shape
14 lines · one 14-line stanza
Line length
Mostly 10-syllable lines (pentameter length).

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Text, source & rights

A traceable edition

Full-text display is based on the committed source record and a United States term-expiry review.

Author record
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow1807–1882
Source record
PoetryDBThe Evening Star by henry-wadsworth-longfellow, PoetryDB transcription
Display decision
Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
Publication record
Not recorded in the imported source
Text fingerprint
SHA-256 5a210b5766cafc35
Editorial handling
Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
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