| Hunt and Lee, comps. The Book of the Sonnet. 1867. | | | | IV. Egypt | | By Thomas Bailey Aldrich (1836–1907) |
| | | FANTASTIC Sleep is busy with my eyes: | |
| I seem in some waste solitude to stand | |
| Once ruled of Cheops: upon either hand | |
| A dark, illimitable desert lies, | |
| Sultry and still,—a realm of mysteries; | 5 |
| A wide-browed Sphinx, half buried in the sand, | |
| With orbless sockets stares across the land, | |
| The wofulest thing beneath these brooding skies | |
| Where all is woful, weird-lit vacancy. | |
| ’T is neither midnight, twilight, nor moonrise. | 10 |
| Lo! while I gaze, beyond the vast sand-sea | |
| The nebulous clouds are downward slowly drawn, | |
| And one bleared star, faint-glimmering like a bee, | |
| Is shut i’ the rosy outstretched hand of Dawn. | | | | |
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