Sleep

A poem by Violet Nicolson, Lawrence Hope, Adela Florence Cory Nicolson (1865 – 1904)

There is something so beseeching in the attitude of sleep,

A pathetic resignation, most appealing to the heart. .

There must surely be some secret that the eyes in slumber keep,

Which the lips, on their awakening, could not, if they would, impart.

See yon Slave from Sus, recumbent, with his ebon arms outspread

On the marigolds he crushes to a sheet of golden flowers,

How the mystery of dreaming lends a halo to his head,

And exalts him to a level never reached in waking hours.

In the form that lies impassive, while the sea-wind comes and goes

And uplifts his rags in pity, on its cool refreshing breath

There is something so prophetic of the Last and Great Repose:

Sleep has borrowed, in its quietude, the Dignity of Death.

Though his parted lips are wordless, though he breathes no uttered prayer

Yet his silence seems imploring “Let me deem the noonday night,

For my dreams are velvet-breasted, and they shelter me from care,

I entreat thee not to wake me to the sorrows of the light.”

Ah, sleep on, in peace, my brother, to awaken when thou wi1t,

From the dreams that treat thee kindly, and the rest that sets thee free.

With the wild fig for thy canopy, the marigolds thy quilt,

And, to serve thee for a lullaby, the thunder of the Sea’

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Poems in English 

• Consider This And In Our Time by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• The Common Life by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Cocaine Lil and Morphine Sue by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Christmas Oratio by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Carry Her Over the Water by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Canzone by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Calypso by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Base Words Are Uttered by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Autumn Song by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• August 1968 by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Atlantis by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• As I Walked Out One Evening by W. H. Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• As We Like It by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• As the poets have mournfully sung by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Are You There? by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• After Reading a Child’s Guide to Modern Physics by W. H. Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Academic Graffiti by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• A Walk After Dark by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• A New Year Greeting by W H Auden by Wystan Hugh Auden (W.H. Auden)
• Continual Conversation With A Silent Man by Wallace Stevens by Wallace Stevens

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