Collected poems, 1901-1918/Sleep

by Walter de la Mare

SLEEP

MEN all, and birds, and creeping beasts,
When the dark of night is deep,
From the moving wonder of their lives
Commit themselves to sleep.

Without a thought, or fear, they shut
The narrow gates of sense;
Heedless and quiet, in slumber turn
Their strength to impotence.

The transient strangeness of the earth
Their spirits no more see:
Within a silent gloom withdrawn,
They slumber in secrecy.

Two worlds they have — a globe forgot
Wheeling from dark to light;
And all the enchanted realm of dream
That burgeons out of night.