The Coming on of Night

“The Coming on of Night” is a short poem about growing older and facing death. In this poem, “night” (Line 10) is both literal and a metaphor for the end of a person’s life. The poet uses the communal pronoun “we” (Line 9) to signify that this is a poem about something that happens to all people, not just to the speaker. She uses metaphor, as well as sentence length, to create a sense of the suddenness of the change.

The first sentence is long and dwells on the “ambition” (Line 1) and “abstract / spark of hunger” (Lines 3-4) that characterize a life. This sentence is long because the subject matter comprises most of a person’s existence. Pursuing “hunger” (Line 4) takes up the majority of one’s living years. It is also a long sentence because the speaker is talking not only about herself but humankind in general. In the second stanza, when she elaborates on other people, noting “even those whose fiery / eccentricities seemed / inextinguishable […]” (Lines 5-7), she is taking time to explain that what she is saying applies to everyone, even those who appear remarkable. There is no vaulting ambition great enough to exempt any human being from the process toward the grave. Everyone will eventually “fade” (Line 7) or be “snuffed out” (Line 8). It is then that all people come to the “peace / of evensong” (Lines 9-10).

The last stanza signifies that the end of life feels brief and definitive. Whereas the first part of the poem takes up the majority of the poem, the last two sentences at the end don’t take up much space. They employ periods, which tell the reader to stop, much as death forces a person to stop in their tracks. When she says, “All the clocks are changed now” (Line 14), she is suggesting not only that time has passed, but that time itself has “changed.” This could mean a person’s priorities change, their perspective changes, or their feeling about how much time they have changed. It feels unpredictable. The rules have “changed” (Line 14) and become different from what they were at an earlier time in life.

Pastan makes the change clear in the final lines: “It is almost time to feel our way / out of the world” (Lines 15-16) She makes it clear that “The Coming on of Night” is not just literally the coming of darkness but a figurative way of discussing the coming of death. “To feel our way / out of the world” (Lines 15-16) is another way of saying it is time to die. Whereas the first sentence was so long and took so much time to unfold, the last sentence is quite brief, creating a sense that death itself is brief in comparison to the longevity of life. It creates a sense of finality and totality.