| |
| GO to sleep—though of course you will not— | |
| to tideless waves thundering slantwise against | |
| strong embankments, rattle and swish of spray | |
| dashed thirty feet high, caught by the lake wind, | |
| scattered and strewn broadcast in over the steady | 5 |
| car rails! Sleep, sleep! Gulls’ cries in a wind-gust | |
| broken by the wind; calculating wings set above | |
| the field of waves breaking. | |
| Go to sleep to the lunge between foam-crests, | |
| refuse churned in the recoil. Food! Food! | 10 |
| Offal! Offal! that holds them in the air, wave-white | |
| for the one purpose, feather upon feather, the wild | |
| chill in their eyes, the hoarseness in their voices— | |
| sleep, sleep … | |
| |
| Gentlefooted crowds are treading out your lullaby. | 15 |
| Their arms nudge, they brush shoulders, | |
| hitch this way then that, mass and surge at the crossings— | |
| lullaby, lullaby! The wild-fowl police whistles, | |
| the enraged roar of the traffic, machine shrieks: | |
| it is all to put you to sleep, | 20 |
| to soften your limbs in relaxed postures, | |
| and that your head slip sidewise, and your hair loosen | |
| and fall over your eyes and over your mouth, | |
| brushing your lips wistfully that you may dream, | |
| sleep and dream— | 25 |
| A black fungus springs out about lonely church doors— | |
| sleep, sleep. The Night, coming down upon | |
| the wet boulevard, would start you awake with his | |
| message, to have in at your window. Pay no | |
| heed to him. He storms at your sill with | 30 |
| cooings, with gesticulations, curses! | |
| You will not let him in. He would keep you from sleeping. | |
| He would have you sit under your desk lamp | |
| brooding, pondering; he would have you | |
| slide out the drawer, take up the ornamented dagger | 35 |
| and handle it. It is late, it is nineteen-nineteen— | |
| go to sleep, his cries are a lullaby; | |
| his jabbering is a sleep-well-my-baby; he is | |
| a crackbrained messenger. | |
| |
| The maid waking you in the morning | 40 |
| when you are up and dressing, | |
| the rustle of your clothes as you raise them— | |
| it is the same tune. | |
| At table the cold, greenish, split grapefruit, its juice | |
| on the tongue, the clink of the spoon in | 45 |
| your coffee, the toast odors say it over and over. | |
| |
| The open street-door lets in the breath of | |
| the morning wind from over the lake. | |
| The bus coming to a halt grinds from its sullen brakes— | |
| lullaby, lullaby. The crackle of a newspaper, | 50 |
| the movement of the troubled coat beside you— | |
| sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep … | |
| It is the sting of snow, the burning liquor of | |
| the moonlight, the rush of rain in the gutters packed | |
| with dead leaves: go to sleep, go to sleep. | 55 |
| And the night passes—and never passes— | |
| |
