| Higginson and Bigelow, comps. American Sonnets. 1891. | | | | Sleep | | By Thomas Bailey Aldrich (1836–1907) |
| | | WHEN to soft Sleep we give ourselves away, | |
| And in a dream as in a fairy bark | |
| Drift on and on through the enchanted dark | |
| To purple daybreak—little thought we pay | |
| To that sweet bitter world we know by day. | 5 |
| We are clean quit of it, as is a lark | |
| So high in heaven no human eye can mark | |
| The thin swift pinion cleaving through the gray. | |
| Till we awake ill fate can do no ill, | |
| The resting heart shall not take up again | 10 |
| The heavy load that yet must make it bleed; | |
| For this brief space the loud world’s voice is still, | |
| No faintest echo of it brings us pain. | |
| How will it be when we shall sleep indeed? | | | | |
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