Poetry and Sleep
Narcolepsy
Young Night Thought
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-1894)
All night long and every night,
When my mama puts out the light,
I see the people marching by,
As plain as day, before my eye.
Armies and emperors and kings,
All carrying different kinds of things,
And marching in so grand a way,
You never saw the like by day.
So fine a show was never seen
At the great circus on the green;
For every kind of beast and man
Is marching in that caravan.
At first they move a little slow,
But still the faster on they go,
And still beside them close I keep
Until we reach the town of Sleep.
I’m not waving—I’m drowning
Jean A. Gittins
I Wish I knew what’s happening
I wish someone could see,
That I am not malingering,
There’s something wrong with me.
Perhaps I’m simply going mad,
I always need to sleep,
And every time I start to laugh,
I fall down in a heap.
I used to be quite good at school,
A rather clever lass,
But now my marks are awful,
I keep dozing off in class.
My Mum say, I’ll grow out of it,
If I’m not late to bed,
My Dad thinks I’m bone idle.
I just wish that I was dead.
I’m almost suicidal,
How much can one girl take?
I need to sleep 10 times a day,
At night I lay awake.
I wish I knew what’s happening,
Life used to be such fun,
Now it’s a fight to stay awake,
Am I the only one?
Who knows I’m not malingering?
Oh God, please make them see,
I don’t do it on purpose,
There is something wrong with me.
My Dignity
Pam Boyette
Let me fall asleep at dinner
With people all around.
I don’t care.
Let me hear a funny joke
Then fall quickly to the ground.
I don’t care.
Just leave me with some dignity
And with my brain in tact.
Let me tend to all my duties
Recognizing fantasy from fact.
So my driving days are over
Now I’m home most all the time.
Just leave me with some dignity
I’ll learn to do just fine.
I no longer go to work each day
You see I miss it very much.
Some people that I thought were friends
Haven’t called—We’ve lost touch.
While none of this would be my choosing
And where no one did ask me.
I’ll make it and I’ll be all right
If left, with just my dignity
Further Language from Truthful James
(Nye’s Ford, Stanislaus, 1870)
Bret Harte
Do I sleep? Do I dream?
Do I wonder and doubt?
Are things what they seem?
Or is visions about?
Is our civilisation a failure?
Or is the Caucasian played out?
Windy Nights
Robert Louis Stevenson
Whenever the moon and stars are set,
Whenever the wind is high,
All night long in the dark and wet,
A man goes riding by.
Late in the night when the fires are out,
Why does he gallop and gallop about?
Whenever the trees are crying aloud,
And ships are tossed at sea,
By, on the highway, ow and loud,
By at the gallop goes he.
By at the gallop he goes, and then
By he comes back at the gallop again.
Nodding
Steve Smith
Tizdal my beautiful cat
Lies on the old rag mat
In front of the kitchen fire.
Outside the night is black.
The great fat cat
Lies with his paws under him
His whiskers twitch in a dream,
He is slumbering.
The clock on the mantelpiece
Ticks unevenly, tic toc, tic-toc,
Good heavens what is the matter
With the kitchen clock?
Outside an owl hunts,
Hee hee hee hee,
Hunting in the Old Park
From his snowy tree.
What on earth can he find in the park tonight,
It is so wintry?
Now the fire burns suddenly too hot
Tizdal gets up to move,
Why should such an animal
Provoke our love?
The twigs from the elder bush
Are tapping on the window pane
As the wind sets them tapping,
Now the tapping begins again.
One laughs on a night like this
In a room half firelight half dark
With a great lump of a cat
Moving on the hearth,
And the twigs tapping quick,
And the owl in an absolute fit.
One laughs supposing creation
Pays for its long plodding
Simply by coming to this—
Cat, night, fire—and a girl nodding.
« Back to Sleep and Poetry page |
