Dear Dean, I'm in a sad condition,
I cannot see to read or write;
Pity the darkness of the Priscian,
Whose days are all transformed to night.
My head, though light's a dungeon grown,
The windows of my skull are closed;
Therefore to sleep I lay me down,
My verse and I are both composed.
Sleep, did I say? That cannot be,
For who can sleep that wants his eyes?
My bed is useless then to me,
Therefore I lay me down to rise.
Unnumbered thoughts pass to and fro
Upon the surface of my brain;
In various maze they come and go,
And come and go again.
So have you seen in sheet burnt black
The fiery sparks at random run,
Now here, now there, some turning back,
Some ending where they just begun.