Let Evening Come

“Coming Home at Twilight in Late Summer” by Jane Kenyon (1983)

This poem, while different in perspective and content from “Let Evening Come,” occupies a similar space, contrasting the natural with the domestic (the pear tree contrasted with the house chores that need to be done). Kenyon was fond of weaving these two elements together. “Coming Home at Twilight in Late Summer” and “Let Evening Come” are two examples of this fixation.

“Her Garden” by Donald Hall (2006)

Donald Hall, Jane Kenyon’s husband, was a prominent poet himself. “Her Garden,” written after Kenyon’s death, is a poem likely in response to her death and what she left behind. Reading Hall’s poems offers an insight into Kenyon’s. Originally Hall’s student, Kenyon and Hall shared a life together, each writing poems that offer insights into the other as a poet and a person.

“The Clearing” by Jane Kenyon (1986)

“The Clearing” demonstrates another example of Kenyon’s preoccupations as a poet: An interest in nature, domesticity, and rural life on a farm. Many of Kenyon’s poems, like this one, are written from the first-person perspective. Reading Kenyon’s poems will give readers an idea as to how “Let Evening Come” deviates from Kenyon’s more typical poems written as free verse meditations.