"What of the night, colleen, what of the night?" 
Oh, fires are red and the snows are white: 
But on one dear hearth that I used to know 
The fire is quenched with the drifted snow. 

"What bird is it, colleen, that cries so shrill?" 
Tis I; and I cry for a kind voice still — 
For a kind hand slipped from my clinging hold, 
For my place in a heart that to-night is cold. 

"What of the night, colleen, what of the night?" 
Oh, never a star dares show its light, 
But wildfire signals to ships at sea — 
And Miscann Many's the fire for me. 

One may sit by the wild-fire, and half forget 
The hands that parted, the lips that met: 
One may warm one's grief there; for deathly cold 
Is the heart that has never a pain to hold. 

"What pain is it, colleen, you'd win again 
By the fire that's quenched not of wind or rain? 
Why sit you silent the while you spin, 
As if your sorrow were half a sin?" 

What use of wailing? more use to spin, 
And dearest is sorrow that's half a sin — 
And the ghostly feet that I hear on the stair, 
Oh, they must walk soft though my heart go bare. 

Oh, mother, mother, one thing alone 
Keeps shut my lips that would fain make moan, 
It is that alone in the night I go 
And dree my weird betwixt snow and snow. 

Oh, sea-blue eyes of you, yellow head, 
You passed ere the flowers on the thorn were dead: 
And I give God thanks, though the ways be white, 
That His snows fall only on me to-night. 

Whither O whither love shall we go,
For a score of sweet little summers or so'
The sweet little wife of the singer said,
On the day that follow'd the day she was wed,
'Whither O whither love shall we go?'
And the singer shaking his curly head
Turn'd as he sat, and struck the keys
There at his right with a sudden crash,
Singing, 'and shall it be over the seas
With a crew that is neither rude nor rash,
But a bevy of Eroses apple-cheek'd,
In a shallop of crystal ivory-beak'd,
With a satin sail of a ruby glow,
To a sweet little Eden on earth that I know,
A mountain islet pointed and peak'd;
Waves on a diamond shingle dash,
Cataract brooks to the ocean run,
Fairily-delicate palaces shine
Mixt with myrtle and clad with vine,
And overstream'd and silvery-streak'd
With many a rivulet high against the Sun
The facets of the glorious mountain flash
Above the valleys of palm and pine.'

'Thither O thither, love, let us go.'

'No, no, no!
For in all that exquisite isle, my dear,
There is but one bird with a musical throat,
And his compass is but of a single note,
That it makes one weary to hear.'

'Mock me not! mock me not! love, let us go.'

'No, love, no.
For the bud ever breaks into bloom on the tree,
And a storm never wakes on the lonely sea,
And a worm is there in the lonely wood,
That pierces the liver and blackens the blood,
And makes it a sorrow to be.'