Francis Quaries - Peter Reading - William Shakespeare - Edgar Allan Poe - Mary Shelley - Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - James Russell Lowell - John Milton - Thomas Hardy -
We spend our midday sweat our midnight oil;
We tire the night in thought, the day in toil. Francis Quaries, Emblems, 1635
Midnight,
a hotel bedroom, open window,
sibilant tyres on rain-washed asphalt streets
whispering a repetitious finish, finish
You stroke your love comprehensively,
who purrs contentment, clings to your neck and
sobs. Peter Reading, Midnight, 1994
We have heard the chimes at midnight. William Shakespeare, II Henry IV III ii 231
The iron tongue of midnight hath told twelve. William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night’s Dream V i 356-357
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary. Edgar Allan Poe
What terrified me will terrify others; and I need only describe the spectre which had haunted my midnight pillow. Mary Shelley
I stood on the bridge at midnight,
As the clocks were striking the hour,
And the moon rose over the city,
Behind the dark church tower. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Bridge
Midnight! the outpost of advancing day!
The frontier town and citadel of night! Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Two Rivers
O wild and wondrous midnight,
There is a might in thee
To make the charmed body
Almost like spirit be,
And give it some faint glimpses
Of immortality! James Russell Lowell, Midnight
Soon as midnight brought on the dusky hour
Friendliest to sleep and silence. John Milton, Paradise Lost V:667
To persons standing alone on a hill during a clear midnight such as this, the roll of the world eastward is almost a palpable movement. Thomas Hardy, Far from the Madding Crowd