O NIGHT! Thou friend of Thought, of Song, of winged

Inspiration! So gentle is thy tread,

Thy hand so soft, thy look so deep, the sea

Is not so deep as thy mysterious gaze.

Revealest thou what worlds have thought in distant,

Unfathomable dream? Thou knowest wonders,

And tellest them in whispers to the dreamer.

Thou art alive with silence, gentle Night,

The silence of the Past and of the Future,

Of things untold, but not forgotten, dreams

Unreal, yet full of burning truth, and clad

In image, that they startle not our heart,

Nor wake its nerveless beating till it sounds.

In silence, wondrous Night, thou teachest what

The noisy Day would never understand:

Thou makest us descend into the mine

Yet unexplorèd of our soul, that hoards

The many destinies of thousand years

And other thousand years it wandered through.

Search in the darkness of that mine, behold!

The gold that shineth forth into thine eyes,

The treasures of those other lives that death

Transformed and left them unremembered. In

The stillness that surrounds thy search thy soul

Will show thee all its strength and weakness, all

Those errors that condemned it to another

And yet another life, to die again,

And rise again and wander, yet a stranger,

Into the changing world, but laden with

The knowledge of the past it seems to learn

And calls it history, perchance its own

Forgotten past, the very person that

It seemed to be. And now it wonders why

That person acted so and erred and wrought

Such destinies. And all the time it is

Itself that learns itself. Neglect not dreams

Nor call them worthless. Great the truths they bring,

Revealed in sights and legendary lore.

When understood they are a blessing. Learn

To understand the vision's soul, the thought

Which it conveys, the future it reveals,

The past it fetches out of yonder mine

Thy brain was far too tired or far too weak

To search. When plunged in sleep that brain that now

Is thine will listen and may learn such things

Thy soul will tell, as never book or school

Or present life will teach. Oh, blessed Night!

Spread o'er my soul thy wings and carry me

Into those worlds my brain can never reach!

Fathom not memories, but let me feel

At one with all those lights that lie upon

Thy bosom, breathing, shining there in silence.