Night Flight: While the World Is Sleeping by Pamela Duncan Edwards

Come, little sleepyhead, come with me.
I have left my hill, high in the tree.
Oh, what wondrous things we will see.
While the world is sleeping.

A giant white owl invites a sleepy child to fly along on a dreamlike journey among the creatures of the night. The bright pajama-clad tot gladly opens her bedroom window and climbs aboard the owl's ample back and immediately finds herself in a midnight world where not all are sleeping, the world of nocturnal woodland creatures.

Silver fish are swimming past,
In the river running fast.
Will they reach the sea at last?
While the world is sleeping.

A bright-eyed fox is on the prowl.
He hopes to take a juicy fowl,
Until he hears the guard dog howl.
While the world is sleeping.

The entranced child watches baby rabbits at play, beavers at work on their dam, and a wise mouse mother warning her babies of the dangers all around while she soars on the downy owl's back through the night, until at last it is time to return to the sleeping world at home.

And soon the rooster's song will warm.
Dark is going, it is almost dawn.
The day is waiting to be born.
The world has finished sleeping.

Best-selling author Pamela Duncan Edwards' anti-lullaby is both dreamlike reverie and thrilling night adventure in her brand-new While The World Is Sleeping (Orchard Books, 2010). Duncan's simple lyric verse is artfully set forth by Daniel Kirk, (author/illustrator of the best-selling Library Mouse, Abrams, 2007) in lively but fantasy-inspired illustrations of the separate lives of creatures who, like the young child, are lovers of the night, while in his final painting we see the golden sun rising behind the chicken coop, the owl, with a farewell look, briefly perched on top, while in the foreground, the sleepy child rubs her eyes and seems to wonder if she has dreamed this sleep-time adventure. Pair this one with Susan Swanson's 2009 Caldecott Award book, The House in the Night,--and sweet dreams to all!