Francis William Bourdillon

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Francis William Bourdillon (22 March 1852 – 13 January 1921) was a British poet and translator.
Born in Runcorn, Cheshire, Bourdillon was educated at Worcester College, Oxford. He acted as tutor to the sons of Prince Christian of Schleswig-Holstein. Later he lived in Eastbourne, and near Midhurst, Sussex.
He is known mostly for his poetry, and in particular the single short poem "The Night Has a Thousand Eyes". He, in fact, had many collections published, including Among The Flowers, And Other Poems (1878), Minuscula: lyrics of nature, art and love (1897, siftings of three smaller volumes of verse published anonymously at Oxford in 1891, 1892, and 1894), Gerard and Isabel: a Romance in Form of Cantefable (1921), and also Chryseis, and Preludes and Romances (1908).

In 1896 he published Nephelé, a romantic novel. He translated Aucassin et Nicolette as Aucassin and Nicolet (1887), and he wrote the scholarly The Early Editions of the Roman de la Rose (1906) as well as Russia Reborn (1917) and various essays which the Religious Tract Society published.


Poems published in Translatum:

• The Night Has a Thousand Eyes

[Frederique]

Francis William Bourdillon, The Night Has a Thousand Eyes

The night has a thousand eyes,
    And the day but one;
Yet the light of the bright world dies
    With the dying sun.

The mind has a thousand eyes,
    And the heart but one;
Yet the light of a whole life dies
    When love is done.