En.Citatepedia^®.ro

Ancient Gaelic Melody

I.
Birds of omen dark and foul,
Night-crow, raven, bat, and owl,
Leave the sick man to his dream -
All night long he heard you scream.
Haste to cave and ruin'd tower,
Ivy tod, or dingled-bower,
There to wink and mop, for, hark!
In the mid air sings the lark.

II.
Hie to moorish gills and rocks,
Prowling wolf and wily fox, -
Hie ye fast, nor turn your view,
Though the lamb bleats to the ewe.
Couch your trains, and speed your flight,
Safety parts with parting night;
And on distant echo borne,
Comes the hunter's early horn.

III.
The moon's wan crescent scarcely gleams,
Ghost-like she fades in morning beams;
Hie hence, each peevish imp and fay
That scarce the pilgrim on his way, -
Quench, kelpy! quench, in bog and fen,
Thy torch, that cheats benighted men;
Thy dance is o'er, thy reign is done,
For Benyieglo hath seen the sun.

IV.
Wild thoughts, that, sinful, dark, and deep,
O'erpower the passive mind in sleep,
Pass from the slumberer's soul away,
Like night-mists from the brow of day:
Foul hag, whose blasted visage grim
Smothers the pulse, unnerves the limb,
Spur thy dark palfrey, and begone!
Thou darest not face the godlike sun.

poem by Sir Walter Scott
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Knight's Return

Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.
The were wolves mutter, the night hawks moan,
The raven croaks from the Raven-stone;
What care I for his boding groan,
Riding the moorland to come to mine own?
Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.

Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.
Long have I wander'd by land and by sea,
Long have I ridden by moorland and lea;
Yonder she sits with my babe on her knee,
Sits at the window and watches for me!
Hark! hark! hark!
The lark sings high in the dark.

Written for music, 1857.

poem by Charles Kingsley
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Dark Night

Dark dark night storm over me
Dark night is a holy blur
Dark dark night stop taunting me
Dark night and I think of her
Dark dark night I'm so lonely
Dark night why leave in me such a mess
Dark dark night I feel so much
Dark night filled with nothingness
Dark dark night please please
Bring the light

poem by Ary Bolanos
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Death of Dusk

The sun resigns,
bleeds out the vestiges –
remnants of the day.

Exsanguination edges into twilight:
red-brown hangs;
upwards darkens:
blue-brown,
blue-black,
death-black,
disquiet – furtive,
like ghoul-ridden fog.

A sombre moon assumes its role,
gushing silver-white lymph upon the muted scape –
a prequel of supernatural undertones
to chill the scene,
ice the spine,
kill the brain –

we have unnerved the very firmament.

But now a shadow closing down the globe:
dinosaurian cloud shrouds the moon glaze,
claims the late hour –
declared in a dying crow caw.

I, the hidden owl
– nemesis of claustrophobic minds –
awake! for mammal flesh –
fresh, jerking out its warmth in dance of death.
Rock-still I perch in sculptured oneness
with my crooked night-tree,
emanating nocturnal allure.

Together we scowl
together we play the dark
upon the land and sky
and mind

while you lie as dead in your box.

Copyright © Mark R Slaughter 2010

dark dark dark dark night dark dark dark dark night
dark dark dark dark night
dark dark dark dark night dark dark
dark dark dark dark night dark dark dark dark night
dark dark dark dark night dark dark
dark dark dark dark night
dark dark dark dark night dark dark dark dark night

poem by Mark R Slaughter
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Dyes Cast

Each night
As he drops his head
To the deep dream
Of the dark bed,
A shape beckons him
Wellaway
From the starlight
And the dim day.

A mare
Black as a spade, calls
From the dark hill
As the wind falls,
The reeds mutter
The night is black
As he leaps blind
To the mare’s back.

Then like the roar
Of an ill wind
Or a black flame
From the devil’s kiln,
The mare speeds
To the night’s work
By the old mill
And the dark Kirk.

Shapes flutter
And leap alight
Before they sputter
And, out of sight
Disport and mutter
Of black arts
To see the mare
And the rider pass.

Hour on hour
He clings to scenes
Of dark images,
Wild dreams
And chance friends
From the dead past
In the grim haunts
Of dyes cast.

His face burns
And tears stream
In the long night
Of the dark dream,
He clings grim
To the mare’s back
For his soul’s sake
And a long lack.

The day brinks
At night’s mist;
‘There may be nothing
More than this, ’
The mare fades
From his wide eyes –
But the thoughts bide,
And the old lies.

‘There may be nothing
More than this! ’
And his mind seeks
The mare, the mist;
‘There may be nought
But the dead past,
And the dark haunts
Of dyes cast.’

27 December 1978

poem by David Lewis Paget
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The Watcher on the Tower

I
The Voice of a Man

WHAT of the Night, O Watcher?

The Voice of a Woman

Yea, what of it?

The Watcher

A star has risen; and a wind blows strong.

Voice of the Man

The Night is dark.

The Watcher

But God is there above it.

Voice of the Woman

The Night is dark; the Night is dark and long.

II
Voice of the Man

What of the Night, O Watcher?

Voice of the Woman

Night of sorrow!

The Watcher

Out of the East there comes a sound, like song.

Voice of the Man

The Night is dark.

The Watcher

Have courage! There’s To-morrow!

Voice of the Woman

The Night is dark; the Night is dark and long.

III
Voice of the Man

What of the Night, O Watcher?

Voice of the Woman

Is it other?

The Watcher

I see a gleam; a thorn of light; a thong.

Voice of the Man

The Night is dark.

The Watcher

The Morning comes, my Brother.

Voice of the Woman

The Night is dark; the Night is dark and long.

IV
Voice of the Man

What now, what now, O Watcher?

The Watcher

Red as slaughter
The Darkness dies. The Light comes swift and strong.

Voice of the Man

The Night was long.—What sayest thou, my Daughter?

Voice of the Woman

The Night was dark; the Night was dark and long.

poem by Madison Julius Cawein
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On Tweed River

Merrily swim we, the moon shines bright,
Both current and ripple are dancing in light.
We have roused the night raven, I heard him croak
As we plashed along beneath the oak
That flings its broad branches so far and so wide,
Their shadows are dancing in the midst of the tide.
'Who wakens my nestlings,' the raven he said,
'My beak shall ere morn in his blood be red,
For a blue-swollen corpse is a dainty meal,
And I’ll have my share with the pike and the eel.'

II.
Merrily swim we, the moon shines bright,
There's a golden gleam on the distant height;
There's a silver shadow on the alders dank,
And the drooping willows that wave on the bank.
I see the Abbey, both turret and tower,
It is all astir for the vesper hour;
The monks for the chapel are leaving each cell,
But where’s Father Philip, should toll the bell?

III.
Merrily swim we, the moon shines bright,
Downward we drift through shadow and light.
Under yon rock the eddies sleep,
Calm and silent, dark and deep.
The Kelpy has risen from the fathomless pool,
He hath lighted his candle of death and of dool:
Look, Father, look, and you’ll laugh to see
How he gapes and he glares with his eyes on thee!

IV.
Good luck to your fishing, whom watch ye to night?
A man of mean or a man of might?
Is it layman or priest that must float in your cove,
Or lover who crosses to visit his love?
Hark! heard ye the Kelpy reply as we passed,-—
'God's blessing on the warder, he lock'd the bridge fast!
All that come to my cove are sunk,
Priest or layman, lover or monk.'
…
Landed—landed! the black book hath won,
Else had you seen Berwick with morning sun!
Sain ye, and save ye, and blithe mot ye be,
For seldom they land that go swimming with me.

poem by Sir Walter Scott
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A Night In Late Autumn

The sky is dark the countryside is quiet
But the spur winged plovers cry out in the night
Above their territory they call and fly
Perhaps the hunting fox is prowling by.

The possums hiss on gum tree in the park
And in a yard nearby a terrier bark
At wailing tom cats fighting on the street
For the right to mate with a female in heat.

The night is calm there's scarce a puff of breeze
And boobook owl hunting for small birds in the cypress trees
Repeat the same call over and again
And frogs are croaking in the pond and drain.

The countryside may seem quiet after dark
But in the sky above the nearby park
The spur winged plovers cry out in the night
Perhaps a fox has driven them to flight

poem by Francis Duggan
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In Thou dark stormy Night

All alone in the night
All alone with my own fright
A lightning strikes, runs across the dead black sky
I am alone
but I wonder, why?

In Thou dark stormy night
In Thou dark stormy night
I call your name with all my might

All alone hanging in the night
My arms are sore, my soul is light
I hear the thunder, in the cloudy black sky
I am scared
but I don't know, why?

In Thou dark stormy night
in Thou dark stormy night
I call your name with all my might

Inside Your house in the night
Calling Your name with all my might
Father! Father! Why have you forsaken me?
'You must die so my people can be free.'

In Thou dark stormy night
In Thou dark stormy night
Jesus drew his final breath
Saving us all from our own eternal death

poem by Summer Song
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Darkness Sets Upon Her

Dark as ebony, dark as night
Dark as the raven in mid flight
Dark as the grave doth her heart grow
Cold and silent as the dead of night
Oh sweet angel of mercy, sweet angel of light
Beckon to her before she takes flight
Speak ever so softly, breath life back into her soul
That she'll not tread life's pathway
A hollow, empty shell full of darkness so foul
That eats away at the radiant light
Which once from the windows of her soul did flow
For quickly doth darkness set upon her
Stealing away what little remains pure
Blackening her heart, blotting out the light
Nevermore to shine, cold and silent as the dead of night

poem by Jennifer Batch
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Nightwalker

I sleep at night
On a cloud high on the horizon
And when I close my eyes
My soul is struck by lightning
Then I sleep at night
Like a storm
Oh, I walk the night
cause your head is gone from my pillow
And when the twilight shines
My eyes crash through the windows
cause I sleep at night without you
When its dark and the night lays me down
When the moon shines the light on the ground
I just run where my thoughts take me to
cause I cant live in this world
Without love without you
I walk the night
I walk the night
Oh, I dream at night
It must be a madmans rainbow that Im chasing
cause when I close my eyes
I feel your sweet sensation
cause I dream at night about you
When its dark and the night lays me down
When the moon shines the light on my ground
I just run where my thoughts take me to
cause I cant live in this world
Without love without you
I walk the night
I walk the night
I just run where my thoughts take me to
cause I cant live in this world
Without love without you
I walk the night
I walk the night

song performed by by Gino Vanelli
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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My Dark Dreams

I'm in the dark
And I'm lost
In my mind, screaming
Through the empty
Space, filled with no light
All I hear is my echo

I listen and hear the echo
Of silent breaking through the dark
Nothingness that consumes any light
That I don't see, in this lost
Place of empty
Dreaming, in which I scream

Soon as it stops, the screaming
High painful cry, and the echo
Fades, leaving me again in the empty
Hallow thoughts of my dark
Sleep, and wander through my mind lost
Of what I had, it was my light

What I had was like a warm light
That held me from the bitter screaming
Of the cold, it found me when I was lost
It covered me like a blanket, and echoed
Through my soul, with it I was never in the dark
And never left empty

Now, in my sleep, I am empty
The warm blanket of hte light
No longer holds me, but exposes me to the dark
And painful piercing screams
Of my own voice echoing
In my nightmares of what I've lost

I am lost
In the emptiness
Of my own pain, that echoes
Through me, and all I want again is the light
For it I scream
In my dreams, but all I get in the dark

I dream of the dark and I'm lost
My screaming is only heard by the empty
Space in my mind, where light shined, but there is only echo.

poem by Nicole Hiebing
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Burn

don't look don't look" the shadows breathe
Whispering me away from you
"don't wake at night to watch her sleep
You know that you will always lose
This trembling
Adored
Tousled bird mad girl... "
But every night i burn
But every night i call your name
Every night i burn
Every night i fall again
"oh don't talk of love" the shadows purr
Murmuring me away from you
"don't talk of worlds that never were
The end is all that's ever true
There's nothing you can ever say
Nothing you can ever do... "
Still every night i burn
Every night i scream your name
Every night i burn
Every night the dream's the same
Every night i burn
Waiting for my only friend
Every night i burn
Waiting for the world to end
"just paint your face" the shadows smile
Slipping me away from you
"oh it doesn't matter how you hide
Find you if we're wanting to
So slide back down and close your eyes
Sleep a while
You must be tired... "
But every night i burn
Every night i call your name
Every night i burn
Every night i fall again
Every night i burn
Scream the animal scream
Every night i burn
Dream the crow black dream
Dream the crow black dream...

song performed by by Cure
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Good-Night

THE lark is silent in his nest,
The breeze is sighing in its flight,
Sleep, Love, and peaceful be thy rest.
Good-night, my love, good-night, good-night.
Sweet dreams' attend thee in thy sleep,
To soothe thy rest till morning's light,
And angels round thee vigil keep.
Good-night, my love, good-night, good-night.
Sleep well, my love, on night's dark breast,
And ease thy soul with slumber bright;
Be joy but thine and I am blest.
Good-night, my love, good-night, good-night.

poem by Paul Laurence Dunbar
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Maybe Baby

I heard stories about you
Id like to think that they were true
I did not know youd be like that
With those surprises under hat
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
When you dance between the stars
In the night late sweet and dark
Turn them over one by one
You dont need to jump the gun
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
When the night is feeling flush
And when the night is all a hush
Electric look eclectic blue
Keep one dream that wont come true
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my maybe baby
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my ma-aybe baby
Be my (echo), be my (echo), be my ma-aybe baby
Maybe baby
Maybe baby
Be my, be my, be my, be my maybe baby
Maybe baby
Maybe baby
Youre the one (? )
Maybe baby
Maybe baby
Maybe baby
Be my, be my, be my, be my maybe baby
(unintelligible) maybe baby
I heard stories about you
Id like to think that they were true
Be my maybe (? )
Be my, be my, be my, be my
(fade)

song performed by by Cars
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Two Spirits: An Allegory

FIRST SPIRIT
O thou, who plum'd with strong desire
Wouldst float above the earth, beware!
A Shadow tracks thy flight of fire--
Night is coming!
Bright are the regions of the air,
And among the winds and beams
It were delight to wander there--
Night is coming!SECOND SPIRIT
The deathless stars are bright above;
If I would cross the shade of night,
Within my heart is the lamp of love,
And that is day!
And the moon will smile with gentle light
On my golden plumes where'er they move;
The meteors will linger round my flight,
And make night day.FIRST SPIRIT

But if the whirlwinds of darkness waken
Hail, and lightning, and stormy rain;
See, the bounds of the air are shaken--
Night is coming!
The red swift clouds of the hurricane
Yon declining sun have overtaken,
The clash of the hail sweeps over the plain--
Night is coming!SECOND SPIRIT

I see the light, and I hear the sound;
I'll sail on the flood of the tempest dark,
With the calm within and the light around
Which makes night day:
And thou, when the gloom is deep and stark,
Look from thy dull earth, slumber-bound,
My moon-like flight thou then mayst mark
On high, far away.----

Some say there is a precipice
Where one vast pine is frozen to ruin
O'er piles of snow and chasms of ice
Mid Alpine mountains;
And that the languid storm pursuing
That winged shape, for ever flies
Round those hoar branches, aye renewing
Its aëry fountains.

Some say when nights are dry and dear,
And the death-dews sleep on the morass,
Sweet whispers are heard by the traveller,
Which make night day:
And a silver shape like his early love doth pass
Upborne by her wild and glittering hair,
And when he awakes on the fragrant grass,
He finds night day.

poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley
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Night

Earth! thou art lovely, when the sinking sun
Hath bathed the clouds in his departing flush,
And, with the moon-lit evening, hath begun
The voiceless, and yet spirit-calming hush,
That thrills around the heart, till tear-drops rush,
Unbidden and uncall'd for, to the eye;
When, save the music of the fountain's gush,
Or the far wailing of the night-bird's cry,
Unbroken silence hangs o'er earth, and wave, and sky.

But now the majesty of midnight storm
Is gathering, in its grandeur, o'er the sky;
The deep black clouds in mustering squadrons form,
And the low, fitful blast, that passes by,
Hath a strange fearful thrilling—like the sigh
Of a sick slumberer; even that hath died,
And in their quiet sleep the waters lie,
As though the winds ne'er curl'd them in its pride,
Or shook the still bent leaves that hang above the tide.

How steadily that ebon mass moves on!
Stretching across the sky in one dark line,
Like a huge wall of blackness; there do none
Of the thin silvery vapours hang supine,
Or those bright clouds that sometimes seem to twine
A coronal to grace the brow of night;
Stars in Orion's studded baldric shine,
In all their wonted brightness; and the light
Of an unclouded moon half dims the dazzled sight.

The tempest hurries onward—how the flash
Of the red lightning leaps from cloud to cloud!
The gathering thunder bursts in one wild crash,
And sinks a moment—then, returning loud,
Seems bounding o'er the sky, as if 't were proud
Of its own potency. We need not now,
A sharer in the thoughts that round us crowd;
The soul is its own world, and the deep glow
Of the rapt spirit seeks no fellowship below.

The wildness of the storm hath pass'd; the rain
Drips from the wet leaves only, and the sky,
With its deep azure beauty, gleams again
Through the rent clouds; the sunken wind swells by,
With a low sobbing; and the clouds, heap'd high,
With the rich moonbeams’ streaming flood of light
Pour'd full upon them, swell before the eye
Like distant snow-clad mountains. Night! O night!
Thou art most glorious! most beautifully bright!

poem by Elizabeth Margaret Chandler from Poetical Works (1836)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
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In A Dark Time

In a dark time, the eye begins to see,
I meet my shadow in the deepening shade;
I hear my echo in the echoing wood--
A lord of nature weeping to a tree.
I live between the heron and the wren,
Beasts of the hill and serpents of the den.
What's madness but nobility of soul
At odds with circumstance? The day's on fire!
I know the purity of pure despair,
My shadow pinned against a sweating wall.
That place among the rocks--is it a cave,
Or a winding path? The edge is what I have.

A steady storm of correspondences!
A night flowing with birds, a ragged moon,
And in broad day the midnight come again!
A man goes far to find out what he is--
Death of the self in a long, tearless night,
All natural shapes blazing unnatural light.

Dark, dark my light, and darker my desire.
My soul, like some heat-maddened summer fly,
Keeps buzzing at the sill. Which I is I?
A fallen man, I climb out of my fear.
The mind enters itself, and God the mind,
And one is One, free in the tearing wind.

poem by Theodore Roethke
Submitted by Dan Costinaş
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The Days They Fly

Hark! The sun it rises
But the mourning dove cries
As morning it dies
Lo, high sun's rise

Hearken! Noontide arrives
But soon the meadowlark sings
And takes to its wings
West, as evening bell rings

Hark! The night the moon illumines
Now hear raven's crow
Those that tarry below
Now midnight you know

Hearken! Morning approaches
Heron's white wings flows
As the seed of dawn grows
No longer caught in dark throes

poem by T.A. Rosenbaum
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The Wild Huntsman

Thy rest was deep at the slumberer's hour
If thou didst not hear the blast
Of the savage horn, from the mountain-tower,
As the Wild Night-Huntsman pass'd,
And the roar of the stormy chase went by,
Through the dark unquiet sky!

The stag sprung up from his mossy bed
When he caught the piercing sounds,
And the oak-boughs crash'd to his antler'd head
As he flew from the viewless hounds;
And the falcon soar'd from her craggy height,
Away through the rushing night!

The banner shook on its ancient hold,
And the pine in its desert-place,
As the cloud and tempest onward roll'd
With the din of the trampling race;
And the glens were fill'd with the laugh and shout,
And the bugle, ringing out!

From the chieftain's hand the wine-cup fell,
At the castle's festive board,
And a sudden pause came o'er the swell
Of the harp's triumphal chord;
And the Minnesinger's thrilling lay
In the hall died fast away.

The convent's chanted rite was stay'd,
And the hermit dropp'd his beads,
And a trembling ran through the forest-shade,
At the neigh of the phantom steeds,
And the church-bells peal'd to the rocking blast
As the Wild Night-Huntsman pass'd.

The storm hath swept with the chase away,
There is stillness in the sky,
But the mother looks on her son to-day,
With a troubled heart and eye,
And the maiden's brow hath a shade of care
Midst the gleam of her golden hair!

The Rhine flows bright, but its waves ere long
Must hear a voice of war,
And a clash of spears our hills among,
And a trumpet from afar;
And the brave on a bloody turf must lie,
For the Huntsman hath gone by!

poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
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The Penitent's Return

My father's house once more,
In its own moonlight beauty! yet around,
Something, amidst the dewy calm profound,
Broods, never marked before!

Is it the brooding night?
Is it the shivery creeping on the air,
That makes the home, so tranquil and so fair,
O'erwhelming to my sight?

All solemnised it seems,
And still'd, and darkness in each time-worn hue,
Since the rich clustering roses met my view,
As now, by starry gleams.

And this high elm, where last
I stood and linger'd - where my sisters made
Our mother's bower, - I deem'd not that it cast
So far and dark a shade!

How spirit-like a tone
Sighs through yon tree! my father's place was there
At evening hours, while soft winds waved his hair!
Now those gray locks are gone!

My soul grows faint with fear!
E'en as if angel-steps had mark'd the sod,
I tremble where I move,-the voice of God
Is in the foliage here!

Is it indeed the night
That makes my home so awful! faithless hearted,
'Tis that from thine own bosom hath departed
The in-born gladdening light!

No outward thing is changed;
Only the joy of purity is fled,
And, long from nature's melodious estranged,
Thou hear'st their tones with dread.

Therefore, the calm abode
By the dark spirit is o'erhung with shade,-
And therefore, in the leaves, the voice of God
Makes thy sick heart afraid!

The night-flowers round that door,
Still breathe pure fragrance on th' untainted air,
Thou, thou alone, art worthy now no more
To pass and rest thee there!

And must I turn away?
Hark, hark! it is my mother's voice I hear,
Sadder than once it seem'd, yet soft and clear -
Doth she not seem to pray?

My name!-I caught the sound!
Oh! blessed tone of love - the deep, the mild,-
Mother, my mother! now receive thy child;
Take back the lost and found.

poem by Felicia Dorothea Hemans
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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