You Angels bright who me defend,
  Enshadow me with curved wing,
And keep me in the darksome night. 
  Till dawn another day do bring.

THE LAMPLIGHTER

When the light of day declines,
And a swift angel through the sky
Kindles God’s tapers clear,
With ashen staff the lamplighter
Passes along the darkling streets
To light our earthly lamps;

Lest, prowling in the darkness,
The thief should haunt with quiet tread,
Or men on evil errands set;
Or wayfarers be benighted;
Or neighbors, bent from house to house,
Should need a guiding torch.

He is like a needlewoman
Who deftly on a sable hem
Stitches in gleaming jewels;
Or, haply, he is like a hero,
Whose bright deeds on the long journey
Are beacons on our way.

And when in the East comes morning,
And the broad splendour of the sun,
Then, with the tune of little birds
Rings on high, the lamplighter
Passes by each quiet house,
And he puts out the lamps.

I MET AT EVE

I met at eve the Prince of Sleep,
  His was a still and lovely face,
He wandered through a valley steep,
  Lovely in a lonely place.

His garb was grey of lavender,
  About his brows a poppy-wreath
Burned like dim coals, and everywhere
  The air was sweeter for his breath.

His twilight feet no sandals wore,
  His eyes shone faint in their own flame,
Fair moths that gloomed his steps before
  Seemed letters of his lovely name.

His house is in the mountain ways,
  A phantom house of misty walls,
Whose golden flocks at evening graze,
  And witch the moon with muffled calls.

Upwelling from his shadowy springs
  Sweet waters shake a trembling sound,
There flit the hoot-owl’s silent wings,
  There hath his web the silkworm wound.

Dark in his pools clear visions lurk,
  And rosy, as with morning buds,
Along his dales of broom and birk
  Dreams haunt his solitary woods.

I met at eve the Prince of Sleep,
  His was a still and lovely face,
He wandered through a valley steep,
  Lovely in a lonely place.

LULLABY

Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul;
The little mouse cheeps plaintively,
The night-bird in the chestnut-tree—­
They sing together, bird and mouse,
In starlight, in darkness, lonely, sweet,
The wild notes and the faint notes meet—­
  Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul.

Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul;
Amid the lilies floats the moth,
The mole along his galleries goeth
In the dark earth; the summer moon
Looks like a shepherd through the pane
Seeking his feeble lamp again—­
  Sleep, sleep, lovely white soul.