O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,

Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse

Without all hope of day!

John Milton (1608-1674): Samson Agonistes. Line 80.

Brightest and best of the sons of the morning,

Dawn on our darkness, and lend us thine aid.

Reginald Heber (1783-1826): Epiphany.

Oh, rather give me commentators plain,

Who with no deep researches vex the brain;

Who from the dark and doubtful love to run,

And hold their glimmering tapers to the sun.

George Crabbe (1754-1832): The Parish Register. Part i. Introduction.

Into each life some rain must fall,

Some days must be dark and dreary.

Henry W Longfellow (1807-1882): The Rainy Day.

Forth from his dark and lonely hiding-place

(Portentous sight!) the owlet Atheism,

Sailing on obscene wings athwart the noon,

Drops his blue-fring'd lids, and holds them close,

And hooting at the glorious sun in heaven

Cries out, "Where is it?"

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834): Fears in Solitude.

Even such is time, that takes in trust

Our youth, our joys, our all we have,

And pays us but with age and dust;

Who in the dark and silent grave,

When we have wandered all our ways,

Shuts up the story of our days.

But from this earth, this grave, this dust,

My God shall raise me up, I trust!

Sir Walter Raleigh (1552-1618): Written the night before his death.—Found in his Bible in the Gate-house at Westminster.

The man that hath no music in himself,

Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,

Is fit for treasons, stratagems, and spoils;

The motions of his spirit are dull as night,

And his affections dark as Erebus.

Let no such man be trusted.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Merchant of Venice. Act v. Sc. 1.

The sun's rim dips; the stars rush out:

At one stride comes the dark;

With far-heard whisper o'er the sea,

Off shot the spectre-bark.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834): The Ancient Mariner. Part iii.

What seest thou else

In the dark backward and abysm of time?

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Tempest. Act i. Sc. 2.

How beautiful is night!

A dewy freshness fills the silent air;

No mist obscures; nor cloud, or speck, nor stain,

Breaks the serene of heaven:

In full-orbed glory, yonder moon divine

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!

Robert Southey (1774-1843): Thalaba. Book i. Stanza 1.

O'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea,

Our thoughts as boundless, and our souls as free,

Far as the breeze can bear, the billows foam,

Survey our empire, and behold our home!

These are our realms, no limit to their sway,—

Our flag the sceptre all who meet obey.

Lord Byron 1788-1824: The Corsair. Canto i. Stanza 1.

The soul's dark cottage, batter'd and decay'd,

Lets in new light through chinks that Time has made.

Stronger by weakness, wiser men become

As they draw near to their eternal home:

Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view

That stand upon the threshold of the new.

Edmund Waller (1605-1687): On the Divine Poems.

Thus with the year

Seasons return; but not to me returns

Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn,

Or sight of vernal bloom or summer's rose,

Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;

But cloud instead, and ever-during dark

Surrounds me; from the cheerful ways of men

Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair

Presented with a universal blank

Of Nature's works, to me expung'd and raz'd,

And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book iii. Line 40.

The sky is changed,—and such a change! O night

And storm and darkness! ye are wondrous strong,

Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light

Of a dark eye in woman! Far along,

From peak to peak, the rattling crags among,

Leaps the live thunder.

Lord Byron 1788-1824: Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. Canto iii. Stanza 92.

What in me is dark

Illumine, what is low raise and support,

That to the height of this great argument

I may assert eternal Providence,

And justify the ways of God to men.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book i. Line 22.

O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,

Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse

Without all hope of day!

John Milton (1608-1674): Samson Agonistes. Line 80.

The leaves of memory seemed to make

A mournful rustling in the dark.

Henry W Longfellow (1807-1882): The Fire of Drift-wood.

It was that fatal and perfidious bark,

Built in th' eclipse, and rigg'd with curses dark.

John Milton (1608-1674): Lycidas. Line 100.

Dear, beauteous death, the jewel of the just!

Shining nowhere but in the dark;

What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust,

Could man outlook that mark!

Henry Vaughan (1621-1695): They are all gone.

The sun to me is dark

And silent as the moon,

When she deserts the night

Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.

John Milton (1608-1674): Samson Agonistes. Line 86.

Which I wish to remark,—

And my language is plain,—

That for ways that are dark

And for tricks that are vain,

The heathen Chinee is peculiar.

Grover Cleveland (1837-1908): Plain Language from Truthful James.

Dark with excessive bright.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book iii. Line 380.

"What is good for a bootless bene?"

With these dark words begins my tale;

And their meaning is, Whence can comfort spring

When prayer is of no avail?

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): Force of Prayer.