TO THE NIGHT

                    137

Night, you fabricator of deceptions,
insane, fantastic, and chimerical,
who show those who derive delight from you
the mountains flattened and the seas gone dry;

inhabitor of hollow, empty brains,
mechanic, alchemist, philosopher,
a vile concealer, lynx that cannot see,
you are of your own echoes terrified:

darkness, fear, and evil are your works,
cautious, poetess, infirm and cold,
with ruffian's hands and feet of fugitive.

Whether I sleep or wake, half my life's yours:
if I'm awake, I pay you the next day,
and if I sleep, I sense not what I live.