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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

TOWARDS DEMOCRACY: PART 4. A CHILD AT A WINDOW by EDWARD CARPENTER

First Line: I SAT IN THE DARK, AT NIGHT, OUTSIDE A LITTLE COTTAGE DOOR
Last Line: LIT BY A MILLION SUNS.
Subject(s): CHILDREN; FEAR; CHILDHOOD;
I SAT in the dark, at night, outside a little cottage door,
And the light from within streamed through the casement and broke in spray
upon the climbing ivy-leaves.
And presently, overhead, a chamber-window opened, and a child peeped
silently forth,
And looked up into the vast night and at the all-trembling stars.

And at the same moment, in a far far globe wheeling unseen round a certain
star, a child-face peeped forth from its habitation, and looked out into the
night, even in the direction of the first child;
And in other globes other faces looked forth;
But they all shrank back and trembled, seeing nothing but vacancy, and
saying, How dark, how vast, how awful is the Night!
Yet all the while it was the great Day of the universe into which they
looked,
Lit by a million suns.



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