Sister, the solemn midnight hour
Is meet, to weave the web
of thought,
To trace the shadowy imagery,
From fancy’s secret
chambers brought.
To enter Memory’s hidden cell,
And bid the sentinel appear;
Her strange, mysterious tales to tell,
And wipe the dust from by-gone
years.
To wander back down time’s dark
stream,
And from its margin pluck
the flowers,
To twine them with the moon’s pale
beams,
Then fling them over Memory’s
bow’rs.
To gather all the fragments up,
The phantoms chase of other
years;
Their blighted joys, their withered hopes,
Their clouds, their sunshine,
and their tears.
We’ll wander forth while others
sleep,
Fanned gently by the night
wind’s sigh
And thus our midnight vigils keep,
While night’s fair lamps
burn bright on high.
We’ll wander in the realms of thought,
That boundless space, who
may define?
From which more dazzling gems are brought
Than sparkle in Golconda’s
mine.
Then, sister, let us linger not,
The conscious moon her lamp
holds high,
And with her smiling, placid face,
Beams from the chambers of
the sky.
Touched by fancy’s magic spell,
We’ll conjure up the
things of yore;
From their cold chambers bring the dead,
And friends of former years
restore.
But oh, the shadows will not stay,
The dreamy shadows of the
past;
Before the sun they’ll fade away
Their mystic visions cannot
last.
Then let us leave the world of dreams
Where shapes and shadows melt
away;
Bathe in salvation’s cooling streams,
And soar to realms of endless
day.