Best Poems - Sleep

Best Poems – SLEEP

“There are worse things than having behaved foolishly in public.
There are worse things than these miniature betrayals,
committed or endured or suspected; there are worse things
than not being able to sleep for thinking about them.
It is 5 a.m.  All the worse things come stalking in
and stand icily about the bed looking worse and worse and worse.”

More melodious the grunting of swine
Than each whine of your nasal tones,
Even sweeter—it can’t be denied—
When sand is fine-crushed between stones.

More meldoious the call of a calf,
The grate of a clattering old mill,
Or the waterfall’s deafening roar
As it foams whitely down from the hill.

More melodious the sea-battered cliffs
Than each snore that drifts out from your breast,
Far sweeter the howling of wolves
Than your weird tunes disturbing my rest.

More melodious the ducks on the lake
than the crake you emit while you sleep,
Seven times sweeter the wave
That comes breaking to shore from the deep.

More melodious the bellowing of bulls
Or a dull-sounding bell roughly rung,
Or the head-spliting wail of a child:
All are milder to me than your tune.

Women in labour lamenting
With no hope of let-up from pain.
Wild geese that cry in bleak night
All sound lighter than your nosey strain.

The screech of a knife scraping brass
Can pass with less pain through my head.
Or the grading of cartwheel on stones.
Than you deep tones that rattle my bed.

The crash of the waves on ships’ sides
Fierce hounds to the skies howling long,
A thousand times sweeter they sound
Than each round of your chest’s strained song.

No hope now remains of repose,
On my scalp your snores stiffen the hair,
Every bellyful blowing from your head,
By Brigid, ’tis agony, I swear!”

“Most holy Night, that still dost keep
The keys of all the doors of sleep,
To me when my tired eyelids close
Give thou repose.

And let the far lament of them
That chaunt the dead day’s requiem
Make in my ears, who wakeful lie,
Soft lullaby.

Let them that guard the hornàed Moon
By my bedside their memories croon.
So shall I have new dreams and blest
In my brief rest.

Fold thy great wings about my face,
Hide day-dawn from my resting-place,
And cheat me with thy false delight,
Most holy Night.”

“Henry’s nocturnal habits were the terror of his women.
First it appears he snored, lying on his back.
Then he thrashed & tossed,
changing position like a task fleet.  Then, inhuman,
he woke every hour or so—they couldn’t keep track
of mobile Henry, lost

at 3 a.m., off for more drugs or a cigarette,
reading old mail, writing new letters, scribbling
excessive Songs;
back then to bed, to the old tune or get set
for a stercoraceous cough, without quibbling
death-like.  His woman’s wrongs

they hoarded & forgave, mysterious, sweet;
but you’ll admit it was no way to live
or even keep alive.
I won’t mention the dreams I won’t repeat
sweating & shaking: something’s gotta give:
up for good at five.”

“You are caffeine
without coffee,
grind away at my thoughts
until they brew for at least
an hour or two,
usually at 2 a.m.,
then you disappear again
and I’m left with a cup
of something I never ordered.

You are the neighbor
who makes me wonder
if an exorcism is performed
at 4 a.m., but I realize
you’re just drunk again.
I’ll still get up for a glass
of holy water.
Maybe it will save me.

Insomnia, rob me
as long as you let me
live to the next day.
You can have my thoughts, 
your loud coins,
just don’t send them
on yourself.”

After counting all the sheep in the world
I enumerate the wildebeests, snails,
camels, skylarks, etc.,

then I add up all the zoos and aquariums,
country by country.

By early light I am asleep
in a nightmare about drowning in the Flood,
yelling across the rising water
at preoccupied Noah as his wondrous
ark sails by and begins to grow smaller.

Now a silhouette on the horizon,
the only boat on earth is disappearing.

As I rise and fall on the rocking waves,
I concentrate on the giraffe couple,
their necks craning over the roof,
to keep my life from flashing before me.

After all the animals wink out of sight
I float on my back, eyes closed.
I picture all the fish in creation
leaping a fence in a field of water,
one colorful species after another.”

“Insomnia, impalpable Creature!
Is all your love in your head
That you come and are ravished to see
Beneath your evil eye man gnaw
His sheets and twist himself with spleen,
Beneath your black diamond eye?

Tell me: why, during the sleepless night,
Rainy like a Sunday,
Do you come to lick us like a dog?
Hope or Regret that keeps watch,
Why, in our throbbing ear
Do you speak low… and say nothing?

Why to our parched throat
Do you always tilt your empty cup
And leave us stretching our neck,
Tantaluses, thirsters for chimeras—
Amorous philter or bitter dregs,
Cool dew or melted lead!

Insomnia, aren’t you beautiful? …
Well, why, lascivious virgin,
Do you squeeze us between your knees?
Why do you moan on our lips,
Why do you unmake our bed,
And … not go to bed with us?

Why, impure night-blooming beauty,
That black mask on your face? …
To fill the golden dreams with intrigue?
Aren’t you love in space,
The breath of Messaline weary
But still not satisfied?

Insomnia, are you Hysteria? …
Are you the barrel organ
Which grinds out the hosanna of the elect? …
Or aren’t you the eternal plectrum
On the nerves of the damned-of-letters
Scraping out their verses—which only they have read?

Insomnia, are you the troubled donkey
Of Buridan—or the firefly
Of hell? —Your kiss of fire
Leaves a chilled taste of red-hot iron … 
Oh! come perch in my hovel! …
We will sleep together a while.”

“Behold the wreckage
of night, one heck
of a mess: covers
disheveled by love,
raucous, gymnastic,
or cast off in vast
deserts of insomnia
where trepidations bomb
tranquility to rubble.
However this hub
of marriage got mangled,
the whole shebang
needs remaking.
So do it. Shake
out sheets and remember
He wanted them
brought in for sailing
female and male
to assure renewal.
Two by two,
Noah’s pattern.
Remember that
when smoothing the wrinkled
comforter and think:
Rebuild the ark 
before the darkness.”

“You’ll never sleep tonight,
Trains will betray you, cars confess
Their destinations,

Whether you like it 
Or not.

They want more
Than to be in
Your dreams

They want to tell you
A story.

They yammer all night and then
The birds take over,
Jeering as only
The well-rested can.”

“Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken winged bird
That cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.”

“The quicksilver song
of the wood thrush spills
downhill from ancient maples
at the end of the sun’s single most
altruistic day.  The woods grow dusky
while the bird’s song brightens.

Reading to get sleepy…Rabbit
Angstrom knows himself so well,
why isn’t he a better man?
I turn out the light, and rejoice
in the sound of high summer, and in air
on bare shoulders—dolce, dolce—
no blanket, or even a sheet.
A faint glow remains over the lake.

Now come wordless contemplations
on love and death, worry about
money, and the resolve to have the vet
clean the dog’s teeth, though
he’ll have to anesthetize him.

An easy rain begins, drips off
the edge of the roof, onto the tin
watering can. A vast irritation rises….
I turn and turn, try one pillow,
two, think of people who have no beds.

A car hisses by on wet macadam.
Then another. The room turns
gray by insensible degrees. The thrush
begins again its outpouring of silver
to rich and poor alike, to the just
and the unjust.

The dog’s wet nose appears
on the pillow, pressing lightly,
decorously. He needs to go out.
All right, cleverhead, let’s declare
a new day.

Washing up, I say
to the face in the mirror,
‘You’re still here! How you bored me
all night, and now I’ll have
to entertain you all day…’”

“When to my lone soft bed at eve returning
Sweet desir’d sleep already stealeth o’er me,
My spirit flieth to the fairy-land of her tyrannous love.

Him then I think fondly to kiss, to hold him
Frankly then to my bosom; I that all day
Have looked for him suffering, repining, yea many long days.

O bless’d sleep, with flatteries beguile me;
So, if I ne’er may of a surety have him,
Grant to my poor soul amorous the dark gift of this illusion.”

“We are a meadow where the bees hum,
mind and body are almost one

as the fire snaps in the stove
and our eyes close,

and mouth to mouth, the covers
pulled over our shoulders,

we drowse as horses drowse afield,
in accord; though the fall cold

surrounds our warm bed, and though
by day we are singular and often lonely.”

Night – James Montgomery

“Night is the time for rest;
How sweet, when labors close,
To gather round an aching breast
The curtain of repose,
Stretch the tired limbs, and lay the head
Down on our own delightful bed!
Night is the time for dreams;
The gay romance of life,
When truth that is, and truth that seems,
Blend in fantastic strife;
Ah! visions, less beguiling far
Than waking dreams by daylight are!
Night is the time for toil;
To plough the classic field,
Intent to find the buried spoil
Its wealthy furrows yield;
Till all is ours that sages taught,
That poets sang, or heroes wrought.
Night is the time to weep;
To wet with unseen tears
Those graves of Memory, where sleep
The joys of other years;
Hopes, that were Angels at their birth,
But perished young, like things of earth…”

“Every night at sleepy-time
Into bed I gladly climb.
Every night anew I hope
That with the covers I can cope.

Adjust the blanket fore and aft,
Swallow next a soothing draught;
Then a page of Scott or Cooper
May induce a healthful stupor.

Oh the soft luxurious darkness,
Fit for Morgan, or for Harkness!
Traffic dies along the street.
The light is out. So are your feet.

Adjust the blanket aft and fore,
Sigh, and settle down once more.
Behold, a breeze! The curtains puff.
One blanket isn’t quite enough.

Yawn and rise and seek your slippers,
Which, by now, are cold as kippers.
Yawn, and stretch, and prod yourself,
And fetch a blanket from the shelf.

And so to bed again, again,
Cozy under blankets twain.
Welcome warmth and sweet nirvana
Till eight o’clock or so manana.

You sleep as deep as Keats or Bacon;
Then you dream and toss and waken.
Where is the breeze? There isn’t any.
Two blankets, boy, are one too many.

O stilly night, why are you not
Consistent in your cold and hot?
O slumber’s chains, unlocked so oft
With blankets being donned or doffed!

The angels who should guard my bed
I fear are slumbering instead.
O angels, please resume your hovering;
I’ll sleep, and you adjust the covering.”

“The people upstairs all practice ballet.
Their living room is a bowling alley.
Their bedroom is full of conducted tours.
Their radio is louder than yours.
They celebrate weekends all the week.
When they take a shower, your ceilings leak. 
They try to get their parties to mix
By supplying their guests with Pogo sticks,
And when their orgy at last abates,
They go to the bathroom on roller skates.
I might love the people upstairs wondrous
If instead of above us, they just lived under us.”

“I remember when my body
was a friend,

when sleep like a good dog
came when summoned.

The door to the future
had not started to shut,

and lying on my back
between cold sheets

did not feel
like a rehearsal.

Now what light is left
comes up—a stain in the east,

and sleep, reluctant
as a busy doctor,

gives me a little
of its time.”

“The night sky is only a sort of carbon paper,
Blueblack, with the much-poked periods of stars
Letting in the light, peephole after peephole—
A bonewhite light, like death, behind all things.
Under the eyes of the stars and the moon’s rictus
He suffers his desert pillow, sleeplessness
Stretching its fine, irritating sand in all directions.

Over and over the old, granular movie
Exposes embarrassments—the mizzling days
Of childhood and adolescence, sticky with dreams,
Parental faces on tall stalks, alternately stern and tearful,
A garden of buggy rose that made him cry.
His forehead is bumpy as a sack of rocks.
Memories jostle each other for face-room like obsolete film stars.

He is immune to pills: red, purple, blue—
How they lit the tedium of the protracted evening!
Those sugary planets whose influence won for him
A life baptized in no-life for a while,
And the sweet, drugged waking of a forgetful baby.
Now the pills are worn-out and silly, like classical gods.
Their poppy-sleepy colors do him no good.

His head is a little interior of grey mirrors.
Each gesture flees immediately down an alley
Of diminishing perspectives, and its significance
Drains like water out the hole at the far end.
He lives without privacy in a lidless room,
The bald slots of his eyes stiffened wide-open
On the incessant heat-lightning flicker of situations.

Nightlong, in the granite yard, invisible cats
Have been howling like women, or damaged instruments.
Already he can feel daylight, his white disease,
Creeping up with her hatful of trivial repetitions.
The city is a map of cheerful twitters now,
And everywhere people, eyes mica-silver and blank,
Are riding to work in rows, as if recently brainwashed.”

“Oh! that my young life were a lasting dream!
My spirit not awak’ning, till the beam
Of an Eternity should bring the morrow.
Yes! tho’ that long dream were of hopeless sorrow,
‘T were better than the cold reality
Of waking life, to him whose heart must be,
And hath been still, upon the lovely earth,
A chaos of deep passion, from his birth.
But should it be—that dream eternally
Continuing—as dreams have been to me
In my young boyhood—should it thus be giv’n,
‘T were folly still to hope for higher Heav’n.
For I have revell’d, when the sun was bright
I’ the summer sky, in dreams of living light
And loveliness,—have left my very heart
In climes of my imagining, apart
From mine own home, with beings that have been
Of mine own thought—what more could I have seen?
‘T was once—and only once—and the wild hour
From my remembrance shall not pass—some pow’r
Or spell had bound me—’t was the chilly wind
Came o’er me in the night, and left behind
Its image on my spirit—or the moon
Shone on my slumbers in her lofty noon
Too coldly—or the stars—howe’er it was,
That dream was as that night-wind- let it pass
I have been happy, tho’ in a dream.
I have been happy—and I love the theme:
Dreams! In their vivid coloring of life,
As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife
Of semblance with reality which brings
To the delirious eye, more lovely things
Of Paradise and Love—and all our own!
Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.”

“Sleep is a suspension midway
and a conundrum of shadows
lost in the meadows of the moon.
    The people sleep.
    Ai! ai! the people sleep
yet the sleepers toss in sleep
and an end comes of sleep
and the sleepers wake.
    Ai! ai! the sleepers wake!”

“Weary with toil, I haste me to my bed,
The dear repose for limbs with travel tired;
But then begins a journey in my head,
To work my mind, when body’s work’s expired:
For then my thoughts (from far where I abide)
Intend a zealous pilgrimage to thee,
And keep my drooping eyelids open wide,
Looking on darkness which the blind do see:
Save that my soul’s imaginary sight
Presents thy shadow to my sightless view,
Which, like a jewel hung in ghastly night,
Makes black night beauteous and her old face new.
   Lo, thus, by day my limbs, by night my mind,
   For thee, and for myself, no quiet find.”

“In winter I get up at night
And dress by yellow candle-light.
In summer, quite the other way,
I have to go to bed by day.  

I have to go to bed and see
The  birds still hopping on the tree,
Or hear the grown-up people’s feet
Still going past me in the street.

And does it not seem hard to you,
When all the sky is clear and blue,
And I should like so much to play,
To have to go to bed by day?”

“When summer came, we locked up our lives and fled
to the woods in Maine, and pulled up over our heads
a comforter filled with batts of piney dark,
tied with crickets’ chirretings and the bork
of frogs; we hid in a sleep of strangeness from
the human humdrum.

A pleasant noise the unordered world makes wove
around us. Burrowed, we heard the scud of waves,
wrack of bending branch, or plop of a fish
on his heavy home; the little beasts rummaged the brush.
We dimmed to silence, slipped from the angry pull
of wishes and will.

And then we had a three-week cabin guest
who snored; he broke the otherness our rest.
As all night long he sipped the succulent air,
that rhythm we shared made visible to the ear
a rich refreshment of the blood. We fed in
unison with him.

A sound we dreamed and woke to, over the snuff
of wind, not loud enough to scare off the roof
the early morning chipmunks. Under our skins
we heard, as after disease, the bright, thin
tick of our time. Sleeping, he mentioned death
and celebrated breath.

He went back home. The water flapped the shore.
A thousand bugs drilled at the darkness. Over
the lake a loon howled. Nothing spoke up for us,
salvagers always of what we have always lost;
and we thought what the night needed was more of man,
he left us so partisan.”