Littell's Living Age/Volume 143/Issue 1847/A Sleepless Night
A Sleepless Night
Within the hollow silence of the night
I lay awake and listened. I could hear
Planet with punctual planet chiming clear,
And unto star star cadencing aright.
Nor these alone. Cloistered from deafeningsight,
All things that are, made music to my ear:
Hushed woods, dumb caves, and many a soundless mere,
With Arctic mains in rigid sleep locked tight.
But ever with this chant from shore and sea,
From singing constellation, humming thought,
And life through times stops blowing variously,
A melancholy undertone was wrought;
And from its boundless prison-house I caught
The awful moan of lone eternity.