Epithalamium: Seventeenth Hour

How brief the golden moment’s occasion
Before its passage into iron age…
The dew has put the pearl on day’s horizon.
Minting hill and field in rarity’s coinage,
Day pays its dues to night, its tax to peace,
Its rent to stars set loose
Within a pastured sky. A sad note more
Of merry tunes and good talk slips the crease
Of dooryard darkness, and fades out before
Spying evening creeps through western windows.
The descending dusk slows
Events and points up violets and nightshades –
A solitary vase arranged just so
Beside the bed where bride and groom go
To pay the mutual debt of maidenhead’s
Incorporation. Perfect honor rules
Their contract, more than jewels
And gold, though the tawdry world can't know this,
Its nature all out of tune with the key of grace.