<SPAN name="chap014"></SPAN>
<h3> BEFORE THE DAWN </h3>
<p class="poem">
In that one darkest hour, before the dawn is here,<br/>
Each soul of us goes sailing, close to the coast of Fear.<br/></p>
<p class="poem">
There in the windless quiet, from out the folded black,<br/>
The things we have forgotten—or would forget—come back.<br/></p>
<p class="poem">
Old sorrows, long abandoned, or kept with lock and key,<br/>
Steal from their prison places to bear us company.<br/></p>
<p class="poem">
All softly come our little sins—our scarlet sins—and gray,<br/>
To keep with us a vigil till breaking of the day.<br/></p>
<p class="poem">
And there are velvet footsteps; or oft we seem to hear<br/>
Light garments brush against the dark; so near—so very near!<br/></p>
<p class="poem">
Then heavily, as weighed by tears, each haunted moment goes,<br/>
For dawn steps down the morning sky, in robes of gray and rose.<br/></p>
<p class="poem">
<SPAN STYLE="letter-spacing: 4em">*****</SPAN><br/></p>
<p class="poem">
O fairies of the forest-ring, and little men in green,<br/>
And pixies of the moonlight, and elves no eye hath seen,<br/>
Brew us a magic potion, of deep and fairy power,<br/>
A draught of Lethe—for one night—to tide us past that hour.<br/></p>
<br/><br/><br/>
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