Quicker than hazel wand The moon discovers water Lifts it from underground Running or still To stir in the light wind All quicksilver.
All that brightness Loosed from the hold Of ground and of shadow Lovers and angels praise, Silver and running gold, Holy, holy, holy.
Think of a dowser walking a field with a hazel stick, waiting for it to twitch over hidden water. Rolfe Humphries says the moon does that job faster. Its light finds water wherever it lies, whether it's running or still, and seems to pull it up out of the dark ground, so the surface trembles in the breeze like liquid silver.
The second stanza widens the view. The brightness has been freed from earth and shadow, and the speaker says lovers and angels both praise it. The poem ends on a threefold "Holy, holy, holy," echoing the language of worship, so the moonlit water becomes something close to sacred.
The speaker's feeling is wonder, close to reverence, and there's no argument or story here, only looking. The mood is hushed and shimmering, helped by short lines and bright words like "quicksilver" and "silver and running gold." You finish the poem feeling that something ordinary has briefly been made holy.