In The Harbour: Chimes

Sweet chimes! that in the loneliness of night Salute the passing hour, and in the dark And silent chambers of the household mark The movements of the myriad orbs of light! Through my closed eyelids, by the inner sight, I see the constellations in the arc Of their great circles moving on, and hark! I almost hear them singing in their flight. Better than sleep it is to lie awake, O'er-canopied by the vast starry dome Of the immeasurable sky; to feel The slumbering world sink under us, and make Hardly an eddy,--a mere rush of foam On the great sea beneath a sinking keel.