Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Asia: Vols. XXI–XXIII. 1876–79. | | | | Arabia: Desert of Arabia | | Desert of Arabia | | Robert Southey (1774–1843) |
| | (From Thalaba the Destroyer, Book I)
HOW beautiful is night! | |
| A dewy freshness fills the silent air; | |
| No mist obscures, nor cloud, nor speck, nor stain, | |
| Breaks the serene of heaven: | |
| In full-orbed glory yonder moon divine | 5 |
| Rolls through the dark blue depths. | |
| Beneath her steady ray | |
| The desert-circle spreads, | |
| Like the round ocean, girdled with the sky. | |
| How beautiful is night! | 10 |
| |
| Who at this untimely hour | |
| Wanders o’er the desert sands? | |
| No station is in view, | |
| Nor palm-grove, islanded amid the waste. | |
| The mother and her child, | 15 |
| The widowed mother and the fatherless boy, | |
| They at this untimely hour | |
| Wander o’er the desert sands. * * * * * | |
| She cast her eyes around, | |
| Alas! no tents were there | 20 |
| Beside the bending sands, | |
| No palm-tree rose to spot the wilderness; | |
| The dark blue sky closed round, | |
| And rested like a dome | |
| Upon the circling waste. | 25 |
| She cast her eyes around, | |
| Famine and Thirst were there; | |
| And then the wretched mother bowed her head, | |
| And wept upon her child. | | | | |
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