Curfew
Curfew - meaning Summary
Nightly Ending and Oblivion
Longfellow's "Curfew" depicts evening as a ritualized ending: the tolling bell signals closure, the hearth and windows darken, and human activity yields to sleep and oblivion. In the second stanza the completed day is likened to a closed book whose fancies cool like coals, turning song to silence. The poem meditates on the cyclical passage from labor to rest and the quiet erasure of memory at day's end.
Read Complete AnalysesI Solemly, mournfully, Dealing its dole, The Curfew Bell Is beginning to toll. Cover the embers, Aand put out the light; Toil comes with morning, And rest with the night. Dark grow the windows, And quenched is the fire; Sound fades into silence,-- All footsteps retire. No voice in the chambers, No sound in the hall! Sleep and oblivion Reign over all! II The book is completed, And closed, like the day; And the hand that has written it Lays it away. Dim grow its fancies; Forgotten they lie; Like coals in the ashes, They darken and die. Song sinks into silence, The story is told, The windows are darkened, The hearth-stone is cold. Darker and darker The black shadows fall, Sleep and oblivion Reign over all.
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