Towards the end of night Life swelters in its gore, The roaring wheels run down, The flames of the gas no more Stab at the iron sky In hissing mockery: And the city takes such rest As its torn nerves know best. O night, that like an eyeless ghost dost prowl 'Twixt granite walls, with talons dripping blood: O night, eared, feathered, like an enormous owl: O night, -- dark vulture that destroys its brood, -- O night of hate and death, O night of nights, We pray to thee, vampire, for the death-stupor of sleep, For we are weary of foolish babble and lights. Along the dismal empty streets, stretching end-lessly away, The darkened houses stand, in a mournful dull array, Like wretched starving folk that silently make show Of asking you for bread: And their windows pale with the starless sky o'erhead Are as maniac faces white with woe, And agony of the living dead. Their doors are barred as the doors of tombs; And alone in the unlit shuttered rooms Sprawl inert bundles of breathing flesh, The weavers of life's mesh. One moved, daylong, amid victory: And one who desires no more to be Is helpless as he! O night that makest all our effort vain, Our lips tremble for thee, our eyes do burn: To some sleep is given; to some, to turn And writhe, and toss, and dream in horrible pain Of the ghastliness of lust, And of every fear and hate! O night, whelm our dry dust In sleep's unfathomed stream, So that not even in dream We can recall our fate! Here and there a belfry-tower, Be it prison, church, or tomb, No one can say: an arm of gloom Beckoning to the sky to tell That not a ray can pierce this hell, -- Lifts its sardonic pride and power, And with jarring and funereal boom Beats a malison on the hour. Here and there a van, iron-wheeled, Rolls like a hearse unlit and sealed; And behind it, the echoes in wild affray Clang and shudder far away: Here and there one footstep-beat Like shattering thunder, shakes the street. Here and there one white arc-light Intensifies the crushing night. O night, that like a blear-eyed cast dost prowl, Sated with blood, gorged with the city's soul: Corpse-snatcher and defiler of the dead, Stalking the city with sepulchral tread: O night of horror, we -- we heed thee not! Oblivion now doth blot The last hope and the last thought from our brains: Thy victory remains: Suck in our helpless lives, destroy this dreadful spot! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...TO BEACHEY, 1912 by CARL SANDBURG THE TROOP SHIP by ISAAC ROSENBERG THE LEPER (2) by NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS POSTHUMOUS by HENRY AUGUSTIN BEERS ECHOES OF SPRING: 8 by MATHILDE BLIND |