Be transported! In Burning the Midnight Oil,Wordwrangler extraordinaire Phil Cousineau has gathered an eclectic and electric collection of soulful poems and prose from great thinkers through the ages. Whether beguiling readers with glorious poetry or consoling them with prayers from fellow restless souls, Cousineau can relieve any insomniac's unease. From St. John of the Cross to Annie Dillard, Beethoven to The Song of Songs, this refreshingly insightful anthology will soothe and inspire all who struggle through the dark of the night.These "night thoughts" vividly illustrate Alfred North Whitehead's liberating description of "what we do with out solitude" and also evoke Henry David Thoreau's reverie,"Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake." The nightwriters in Cousineau's vesperal collection range from saints, poets, and shamans as well as astronomers, naturalists, and tells of ancient tales along with shining passages from the our most brilliant (albeit insomniac) writers of today. These poetic ponderances sing of the falling darkness, revel in dreamtime, convey the ache of melancholy, conspire against sleeplessness, vanquish loneliness, contemplate the night sky, rhapsodize on love, and langorously greet the first rays of dawn.Notable night owls include Rabandranath Tagore, Mary Oliver, Manley Hopkins, Jorge Borges, William Blake, Antler, James Agee, Erin Byrne, Galileo Galilee, Georgia Hesse, Miles Davis, Beryl Markham, Nikos Kazantzakis, Li Po, Mahatma Gandhi, Bruce Chatwin, Linda McFerrin, Theodore Roethke, Leonardo da Vinci, Sharon Olds, Thomas de Quincey, Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Lindbergh, and many more.From the book:So out of the vast night descends a "precarious" power over our souls that inspires us to ask our most vital questions and challenges us to look within and seek without. For night is the time, as Pawnee Indians sing, when "visions travel better." The hour Benedictine monks believe the world needs prayers more than ever. The moment Buddhist monks experience the lowest flame of Kundalini. The dark night of the soul. The dark wall. The midpoint of our nightly soul journey. The black ink from God's pen.When we're sitting quietly with the great mysteries, doing nothing, the soul deepens, prayers happen all by themselves. Some of the words that emerge out of those meditations are meant to rouse us, others to send us into sweet slumber. Which are which?Listening to these night voices, we become alert to a world rapidly disappearing under the artificial light of the modern world. Despite our predatory fears, the night is long and full of marvels. By the light of its dark secrets we can make our own way through the shadowworld to the fire at the source of all mystery. Read Less