"And to all, a good night..."
I used part of my Christmas money to buy some new pants for work today. They're really nice. I also want to get a new set of dog dishses for Sable.
Posted for no reason, here are my favorite poems to read before going to bed. Comments by Rebecca in red.
After Apple-Picking, Robert Frost
My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still,
And there's a barrel that I didn't fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now.
Essence of winter sleep is on the night,
The scent of apples: I am drowsing off.
I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight
I got from looking through a pane of glass
I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough
And held against the world of hoary grass.
It melted, and I let it fall and break.
But I was well
Upon my way to sleep before it fell,
And I could tell
What form my dreaming was about to take.
Magnified apples appear and disappear,
Stem end and blossom end,
And every fleck of russet showing clear.
My instep arch not only keeps the ache,
It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.
I feel the ladder sway as the boughs bend.
And I keep hearing from the cellar bin
The rumbling sound
Of load on load of apples coming in.
For I have had too much
Of apple-picking: I am overtired
Of the great harvest I myself desired.
There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch,
Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall.
For all
That struck the earth,
No matter if not bruised or spiked with stubble,
Went surely to the cider-apple heap
As of no worth.
One can see what will trouble
This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.
Were he not gone,
The woodchuck could say whether it's like his
Long sleep, as I describe its coming on,
Or just some human sleep.
I have many poems memorized, but this is the only one that I cannot only recite, but perform. Probably my favorite of Frost's poetry.
The Brook, Alfred Lord Tennyson
I come from haunts of coot and hern,
I make a sudden sally
And sparkle out among the fern,
To bicker down a valley.
By thirty hills I hurry down,
Or slip between the ridges,
By twenty thorpes, a little town,
And half a hundred bridges.
Till last by Philip's farm I flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I chatter over stony ways,
In little sharps and trebles,
I bubble into eddying bays,
I babble on the pebbles.
With many a curve my banks I fret
By many a field and fallow,
And many a fairy foreland set
With willow-weed and mallow.
I chatter, chatter, as I flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I wind about, and in and out,
With here a blossom sailing,
And here and there a lusty trout,
And here and there a grayling,
And here and there a foamy flake
Upon me, as I travel
With many a silvery waterbreak
Above the golden gravel,
And draw them all along, and flow
To join the brimming river
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I steal by lawns and grassy plots,
I slide by hazel covers;
I move the sweet forget-me-nots
That grow for happy lovers.
I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance,
Among my skimming swallows;
I make the netted sunbeam dance
Against my sandy shallows.
I murmur under moon and stars
In brambly wildernesses;
I linger by my shingly bars;
I loiter round my cresses;
And out again I curve and flow
To join the brimming river,
For men may come and men may go,
But I go on for ever.
I really loved this poem when I first discovered it in middle school. Since then, my liking for it has waned (it borders on too perfect, too picturesque, and too much like a damn Thomas Kinkade painting) but I still enjoy reading it.
City, Langston Hughes
In the morning the city
Spreads its wings
Making a song
In stone that sings
In the evening the city
Goes to bed
Haning lights
About its head
This poem and many others on this list (actually, most of them) are from an anthology of children's poetry that Sara gave me a few Christmases ago. Hughes paints the best urban landscapes.
The Coming of the Teddy Bears, Dennis Lee
The air is quiet round my bed.
The dark is drowsy in my head.
The sky's forgetting to be red,
And soon I'll be asleep.
And half a million miles away
The silver stars come out to play,
And comb their hair and that's okay
And soon I'll be asleep.
And teams of fuzzy teddy bears
Are stumping slowly up the stairs
To rock me in their rocking chairs
And soon I'll be asleep.
The night is shining round my head.
The room is snuggled in my bed.
Tomorrow I'll be big they said,
And soon I'll be asleep.
I love this poem. Its use of words is so creative (like "the dark is drowsy") and it's extraordinary in how well it captures the nonsensical mind of a tired child. Just reading it makes me feel sleepy. It's anyone's guess as to why this poem isn't better known.
Hoeing, John Updike
I sometimes fear the younger generation will be deprived
of the pleasures of hoeing;
there is no knowing
how many souls have been formed by this simple exercise.
The dry earth like a great scab breaks, revealing
moist-dark loam -
the pea-root’s home,
a fertile wound perpetually healing.
How neatly the green weeds go under!
The blade chops the earth new.
Ignorant the wise boy who
has never performed this simple, stupid, and useful wonder.
I doubt I'll ever read another poem that makes me want to hoe a field so much.
Lie in the Dark and Listen, Noel Coward
Lie in the dark and listen
It's clear tonight so they're flying high
Hundreds of them, thousands perhaps
Riding the icy, moonlit sky
Men, machinery, bombs and maps
Altimeters and guns and charts
Coffee, sandwiches, fleece-lined boots
Bones and muscles and minds and hearts
English saplings and English roots
Deep in the earth they've left below
Lie in the dark and let them go
Lie in the dark and listen
Lie in the dark and listen
They're going over in waves and waves
High above villages, hills and streams
Country churches and little graves
And little citizens' worried dreams
Very soon they'll have reached the sea
And far below them will lie the bays
And coves and sands where they used to be
Taken for summer holidays
Lie in the dark and let them go
Lie in the dark and listen
Lie in the dark and listen
City magnates and steel contractors
Factory workers and politicians
Cute hysterical little actors
Ballet dancers, reserved musicians
Safe in your warm civilian beds
Count your profits and count your sheep
Life is flying over your heads
Just turn over and try to sleep
Lie in the dark and let them go
Theirs is a world you'll never know
Lie in the dark and listen
Isn't it obvious just from the title that this is an amazing poem?
My Shadow, Robert Louis Stevenson
I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,
And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.
He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;
And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.
The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow--
Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;
For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball,
And he sometimes goes so little that there's none of him at all.
He hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play,
And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.
He stays so close behind me, he's a coward you can see;
I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!
One morning, very early, before the sun was up,
I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;
But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head,
Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.
I love so many poems from A Child's Garden of Verses. I really should buy a copy of that book. My grandparents were such Stevenson fans that they named my aunt Alison after Stevenson's nanny, to whom the book is dedicated ("To Alison Cunningham, from her boy").
Night Mail, WH Auden
This is the Night Mail crossing the border,
Bringing the cheque and the postal order,
Letters for the rich, letters for the poor,
The shop at the corner and the girl next door.
Pulling up Beattock, a steady climb:
The gradient's against her, but she's on time.
Past cotton-grass and moorland boulder
Shovelling white steam over her shoulder,
Snorting noisily as she passes
Silent miles of wind-bent grasses.
Birds turn their heads as she approaches,
Stare from the bushes at her blank-faced coaches.
Sheepdogs cannot turn her course;
They slumber on with paws across.
In the farm she passes no one wakes,
But a jug in the bedroom gently shakes.
Dawn freshens, the climb is done.
Down towards Glasgow she descends
Towards the steam tugs yelping down the glade of cranes,
Towards the fields of apparatus, the furnaces
Set on the dark plain like gigantic chessmen.
All Scotland waits for her:
In the dark glens, beside the pale-green lochs
Men long for news.
Letters of thanks, letters from banks,
Letters of joy from girl and boy,
Receipted bills and invitations
To inspect new stock or visit relations,
And applications for situations
And timid lovers' declarations
And gossip, gossip from all the nations,
News circumstantial, news financial,
Letters with holiday snaps to enlarge in,
Letters with faces drawn in the margin,
Letters from uncles, cousins, and aunts,
Letters to Scotland from the South of France,
Letters of condolence to Highlands and Lowlands
Notes from overseas to Hebrides --
Written on paper of every hue,
The pink, the violet, the white and the blue,
The chatty, the catty, the boring, adoring,
The cold and official and the heart's outpouring,
Clever, stupid, short and long,
Typed and printed and spelt all wrong.
Thousands are still asleep
Dreaming of terrifying monsters,
Or of friendly tea beside the band at Cranston's or Crawford's:
Asleep in working Glasgow, asleep in well-set Edinburgh,
Asleep in granite Aberdeen,
They continue with their dreams,
And shall wake soon and long for letters,
And none will hear the postman's knock
Without a quickening of the heart,
For who can hear and feel himself forgotten?
This is probably one of my favorite poems of all time. What is there not to love? The final line almost makes me cry.
Poem To Be Read at 3am, Donald Justice
Excepting the diner
on the outskirts
the town of Ladora
at 3am was dark but
for my headlights
and up in
one second story room
a single light
where someone was sick or
perhaps reading
as i drove past
at seventy
not thinking
This poem
is for whoever
had the light on
This is from Garrison Keillor's compilation of Good Poems. There are a lot poems more in that book that are good to read before bed, but I couldn't possibly include them all.
The Rain, Robert Louis Stevenson
The rain is falling all around,
It falls on field and tree.
It rains on the umbrellas here,
And on the ships at sea.
Another one from A Child's Garden of Verses. I cannot remember a time when I didn't know and love this poem.
Rain in the Night, Amelia Josephine Burr
Raining, raining,
All night long;
Sometimes loud, sometimes soft,
Just like a song.
There’ll be rivers in the gutters
And lakes along the street.
It will make our lazy kitty
Wash his little dirty feet.
The roses will wear diamonds
Like kings and queens at court;
But pansies all get muddy
Because they are so short.
I’ll sail my boat tomorrow
In wonderful new places,
But first I’ll take my watering pot
And wash the pansies’ faces.
One of my favorites from our old Childcraft volume of "Poems & Rhymes."
Requiem, Robert Louis Stevenson
Under the wide and starry sky,
Dig the grave and let me lie.
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you grave for me:
Here he lies where he longed to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.
Dad liked this poem.
Summer Storm, Dana Gioia
We stood on the rented patio
While the party went on inside.
You knew the groom from college.
I was a friend of the bride.
We hugged the brownstone wall behind us
To keep our dress clothes dry
And watched the sudden summer storm
Floodlit against the sky.
The rain was like a waterfall
Of brilliant beaded light,
As cool and silent as the stars
The storm hid from the night.
To my surprise, you took my arm-
A gesture you didn't explain-
And we spoke in whispers, as if we two
Might imitate the rain.
Then suddenly the storm receded
As swiftly as it came.
The doors behind us opened up.
The hostess called your name.
I watched you merge into the group,
Aloof and yet polite.
We didn't speak another word
Except to say goodnight.
Why does that evening's memory
Return with this night's storm-
A party twenty years ago,
Its disappointments warm?
There are so many might have beens,
What ifs that won't stay buried,
Other cities, other jobs,
Strangers we might have married.
And memory insists on pining
For places it never went,
As if life would be happier
Just by being different.
So devastatingly sad and beautiful.
Still the Dark Forest, WH Auden
Still the dark forest, quiet the deep,
Softly the clock ticks, baby must sleep!
The pole star is shining, bright the Great Bear,
Orion is watching, high up in the air.
Reindeer are coming to drive you away
Over the snow on an ebony sleigh,
Over the mountain and over the sea
You shall go happy and handsome and free.
Over the green grass pastures there,
You shall go hunting the beautiful deer.
You shall pick flowers, the white and the blue,
Shepherds shall flute their sweetest for you.
And in the castle tower above,
The princess' cheeks burn red for your love,
You shall be king and queen of the land,
Happy forever, hand in hand.
Children's poems can sometimes be too cute and simple, but this one is remarkably sophisticated and somber, even a little sad.
To Sleep, William Wordsworth
A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by
One after one; the sound of rain, and bees
Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas,
Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky;
I've thought of all by turns, and still I lie
Sleepless; and soon the small birds' melodies
Must hear, first uttered from my orchard trees,
And the first cuckoo's melancholy cry.
Even thus last night, and two nights more I lay,
And could not win thee, Sleep! by any stealth:
So do not let me wear tonight away:
Without Thee what is all the morning's wealth?
Come, blessed barrier between day and day,
Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health!
Nothing can put you to sleep so well as a poem about insomnia.
Trees, Harry Behn
Trees are the kindest things I know,
They do no harm, they simply grow
And spread a shade for sleepy cows,
And gather birds among their bows.
They give us fruit in leaves above,
And wood to make our houses of,
And leaves to burn on Halloween
And in the Spring new buds of green.
They are first when day's begun
To touch the beams of morning sun,
They are the last to hold the light
When evening changes into night.
And when a moon floats on the sky
They hum a drowsy lullaby
Of sleepy children long ago...
Trees are the kindest things I know.
It's a poem as lovely as a tree! (Who said they would never see one?)
We'll Go No More A-Roving, Lord Byron
So we'll go no more a-roving
So late into the night,
Though the heart be still as loving,
And the moon be still as bright.
For the sword outwears its sheath,
And the soul wears out the breast,
And the heart must pause to breathe,
And love itself have rest.
Though the night was made for loving,
And the day returns too soon,
Yet we'll go no more a-roving
By the light of the moon.
Discovered in my British Literature survey class in 2006, along with a lot of other really great poems.
What Lips My Lips Have Kissed, Edna St. Vincent Millay
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply;
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in the winter stands a lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet know its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone;
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
I've never read a poem by Millay that I didn't love. But then, has anyone?