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SLEEP.
- LOVE‐CRADLING Night, lit by the lucent moon,
- Most pitiful and mother‐hearted Night!
- Blest armistice in life’s tumultuous fight,
- Resolving discords to a spheral tune!
- When tired with heat and strenuous toil of noon,
- With ceaseless conflict betwixt might and right,
- With ebb and flow of sorrow and delight,
- Our panting hearts beneath their burdens swoon,
- To thee, O star‐eyed comforter, we creep,
- Earth’s ill‐used step‐children to thee make moan,
- As hiding in thy dark skirts’ ample sweep;
- —Poor debtors whose brief life is not their own;
- For dunned by Death, to whom we owe its loan,
- Give us, O Night, the interest paid in sleep.
