A Guide to Refreshing Sleep

[ponygirl2000.livejournal.com]

It is best to remember those nights
when grown-ups were singing and breaking
glass and someone who smelled good
carried you up hushed stairs toward strange
cold bedrooms to be launched on a dark
lake of coats.
 
If Memory does not suffice, you may
summon the obvious mascots of sleep,
but forego counting. It is miserly. They
will come and stand by your bed, nodding
their graceful Egyptian heads, inviting you
 
across the crooked stile to one of those
hamlets nestled between blue hills
where the curious are curious about sleep,
the enthralled are enthralled with sleep,
and the great conclusion is always,
'It's time for bed.'
 
Look - a cottage door stands open. On the night
table is a single candle, yellow sheets are turned
back, and in the garden are marshaled
the best dreams in the world. Lie down.
The horrible opera of the day is over.
Close your eyes, so the world which loves you
can go to sleep, too.

- Ron Koertge

Comments

[prankcaller.livejournal.com]

That's beautiful - thank you for posting it!

[rejectomorph]

It's odd to see Ron Koertge here. I didn't know that he had become that well known. He was a part-time English professor at Pasadena City College when I was going there in the mid 1980's.

[pelegrine.livejournal.com]

"..............and in the garden are marshaled
the best dreams in the world. ..............
Close your eyes, so the world which loves you
can go to sleep, too."

Beuatiful lines ponygirl,
I really enjoyed this. OK i've given my self away, I am a romantic, I admit it! I carry that cottage around in my Heart.
Needless to say, I sleep very well.
Joseph

p.s. it would please me very much if you would consider adding me as a friend.