"Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!"
When I was first reading this poem, I took it to literally mean the speaker was going on a journey at night. It is, of course, full of imagery of night. Words like "evening," "twilight," and "the dark," left a picture of the setting sun and the coming night. However, once I reached the last stanza, I realized that the entire poem had been a metaphor for death. "The bar" would be the line between life and death. The "Pilot" is God, and the "one clear call" is God's call to the speaker. The speaker is dying, but is not mourning this death. He or she wants a peaceful death with "no sadness of farewell," and views it simply as the next step to take.
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