Explore "The Bird in the Night" by Alan Sullivan on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Serie: The White Canoe And other Verse
Once long ago, a summer night in June,
When earth lay still beneath a waning moon.
And never sound or rustle in the wood
Save the dull thunder of a far-off flood,
Hurling itself in ruin to the deep
O'er a great gulf, I lay and strove to sleep.
The stars were out; I watched with aching eye
Their slow grand march across a cloudless sky,
But rest came not; when suddenly I heard,
Far in the slumbering forest, one lone bird
Give three sweet calls, as if in pure delight / To fling its soul in music through the night!
Like a cool hand upon a fevered brow / Came that dear song; all fear had vanished now, / Steady my pulse, sunk in oblivion's arms / Forgetful as a child of past alarms. / Ye who have doubts -- who is it has them not? / Ye who have fears, and troubled anxious thought, / When the storm lulls, will, if ye list aright, / Hear a bird singing in your darkest night.