Count the Stars

That coldest of nights when we lay out-of-door
You told me each star was the mark that a soul
Had lived out its lot and was with us no more.
I wept like the rain; you could not me console.

Yet ever outside did you lay us again
To mark all the marks of the Folk of Before;
I always ceased count at a dozen and ten
Though calmly as stone would you count hundred-score.

Thus do I wonder: you weep like the rain
To see the meek gleam of a single star more;
Like all you have seen do I glitter the same
So count me in too, then count on as before.