Night, Night Listen Well was commissioned by countertenor Steven Rickards and was premiered on April 15, 1993 at Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL. In 1996, Night, Night Listen Well won First Prize at the 18th Annual NACUSA Young Composers Competition.

Night, night, listen
to these troubles, night –
you can hide them
in your disappearing self –
you know a black hole
to steal away to –
all the meter is gone,
all the stanzas reel off
into space, the couplets
sting like overgrown children –
I am an iamb to myself –
neither more nor less,
simply being in time –
mortal, refused, denied, fountd,
and molded to some hand of unsure destiny –
take these away night,
take these meanings
off the wall
and make them day.

– Michael Fitzgerald (1989)