When thou sleepest, lulled in night
Art thou lost in vacancy?
Does no silent inward light
Softly breaking fall on thee?
Does no dream on quiet wing
Float a moment mid that ray?
Touch some answering mental string
Wake a note & pass away
When thou watchest as the hours
Mute & blind are speeding on
O'er that rayless path that lowers
Muffled midnight, black & lone
Comes there nothing hovering near
Thought, or half reality
Whispering marvels in thine ear
Every word a mystery
Chanting low an ancient lay
Every plaintive note a spell
Clearing memory's clouds away
Showing scenes thy heart loves well
Songs forgot, in childhood sung
Airs in youth, beloved & known
Whispered by that airy tongue
Once again are made thine own
Oh how happy, how unbroken
Seems that watchful hour to fly
Be it dream in haunted sleep
Be it thought in vigil lone
Drink'st thou not a rapture deep
From the feeling, tis thine own
All thine own, thou need'st not tell
What bright form thy slumber blest
All thine own, remember well
Night & shade were round thy rest
Nothing looked upon thy bed
Save the lonely watch-light's gleam
Not a whisper, not a tread
Scared thy spirit's glorious dream
Sometimes when the midnight gale
Breathed a moan & then was still
Seemed the spell of thought to fail
Checked by one ecstatic thrill
Felt as all external things
Robed in moonlight smote thine eye
Then thy spirit's waiting wings
Quivered, trembled, spread to fly
Then th' aspirer wildly swelling
Looked where mid transcendancy
Star to star was mutely telling
Heaven's resolve & fate's decree
Oh! it longed for holier fire
Than this spark in earthly shrine
O! it soared & higher higher
Sought to reach a home divine
Hopeless quest, soon weak & weary
Flagged the pinion, drooped the plume
And again in sadness dreary
Came the baffled wanderer home
And again it turned for soothing
To the half-finished broken dream
While the ruffled current smoothing
Though rolled on her startled stream
I have felt this cherished feeling
Sweet & known to none but me
Still I felt it nightly healing
Each dark day's despondency
Art thou lost in vacancy?
Does no silent inward light
Softly breaking fall on thee?
Does no dream on quiet wing
Float a moment mid that ray?
Touch some answering mental string
Wake a note & pass away
When thou watchest as the hours
Mute & blind are speeding on
O'er that rayless path that lowers
Muffled midnight, black & lone
Comes there nothing hovering near
Thought, or half reality
Whispering marvels in thine ear
Every word a mystery
Chanting low an ancient lay
Every plaintive note a spell
Clearing memory's clouds away
Showing scenes thy heart loves well
Songs forgot, in childhood sung
Airs in youth, beloved & known
Whispered by that airy tongue
Once again are made thine own
Oh how happy, how unbroken
Seems that watchful hour to fly
Be it dream in haunted sleep
Be it thought in vigil lone
Drink'st thou not a rapture deep
From the feeling, tis thine own
All thine own, thou need'st not tell
What bright form thy slumber blest
All thine own, remember well
Night & shade were round thy rest
Nothing looked upon thy bed
Save the lonely watch-light's gleam
Not a whisper, not a tread
Scared thy spirit's glorious dream
Sometimes when the midnight gale
Breathed a moan & then was still
Seemed the spell of thought to fail
Checked by one ecstatic thrill
Felt as all external things
Robed in moonlight smote thine eye
Then thy spirit's waiting wings
Quivered, trembled, spread to fly
Then th' aspirer wildly swelling
Looked where mid transcendancy
Star to star was mutely telling
Heaven's resolve & fate's decree
Oh! it longed for holier fire
Than this spark in earthly shrine
O! it soared & higher higher
Sought to reach a home divine
Hopeless quest, soon weak & weary
Flagged the pinion, drooped the plume
And again in sadness dreary
Came the baffled wanderer home
And again it turned for soothing
To the half-finished broken dream
While the ruffled current smoothing
Though rolled on her startled stream
I have felt this cherished feeling
Sweet & known to none but me
Still I felt it nightly healing
Each dark day's despondency