EVEN HERE, EVEN NOW, WHEN THE SUN HAD SET AND THE EVENING STAR WAS chastely touching the bosom of the night, there were things to say, things to do. A drink first! What would he drink to—the past, the present, the future? To all of them! He would drink to the life that embraced the three of them! Here, with whitened hair, desires failing, strength ebbing out of him, with the sun gone down, and with only the serenity and the calm warning of the evening star left to him, he drank to Life, to all it had been, to what it was, to what it would be. Hurrah!
Hurrah!
An excerpt from ‘Sunset and Evening Star,’ 1954.