Ah, Sleep! serenest God! what crime is mine,
That I, the only youth, at thee repine?
Now the husht calm and stillness of repose
O'er fold and nest and lair of woodland grows;
The tree-tops curve their boughs in imaged sleep;
From the fierce torrents altered murmurs creep;
The wave-ridged ocean falls its softened roar,
And seas, at rest, recline upon the shore.
Seven times the moon returns; yet pale and weak,
Distemper sits upon my faded cheek:
The emerging stars, from Ætna's mount that rise
And Venus' fires have re-illumed the skies;
Still, past my plaints, Aurora's chariot flew;
Her shaken lash dropt cold the pitying dew.
Can I endure? Not if to me were given
The eyes of Argus, sentinel of heaven:
Those thousand eyes that watch alternate kept,
Nor all o'er all his body waked or slept.
Ah, me! yet now, beneath Night's lengthening shade,
Some youth's twined arms enfold the twining maid;
Willing he wakes, while midnight hours roll on,
And scorns thee, Sleep! and waves thee to be gone.
Come then from them! Oh, leave their bed for mine;
I bid thee not with all thy plumes incline
On my bowed lids; this kindest boon beseems
The happy crowd that share thy softest dreams:
Let thy wand's tip but touch my closing eye,
Or, lightly hovering, skim and pass me by!