Sleep
Lull me to sleep, ye winds, whose fitful soundSeems from some faint Aeolian harp-string caught;Seal up the hundred wakeful eyes of thoughtAs Hermes with his lyre in sleep profoundThe hundred wakeful eyes of Argus bound;For I am weary, and am overwroughtWith too much toil, with too much care distraught,And with the iron crown of anguish crowned.Lay thy soft hand upon my brow and cheek,O peaceful Sleep! until from pain releasedI breathe again uninterrupted breath!Ah, with what subtile meaning did the GreekCall thee the lesser mystery at the feastWhereof the greater mystery is death!
Words in this poem
- lull v. t.
- To cause to rest by soothing influences; to compose; to calm; to soothe; to quiet. [Akin to OD. lullen to sing to sleep, G. lullen, Dan. lulle, Sw. lulla; all of imitative origin. Cf. Loll, Lollard.]
- fitful a.
- Full of fits; irregularly variable; impulsive and unstable. [From 7th Fit.]
- wakeful a.
- Not sleeping; indisposed to sleep; watchful; vigilant.
- argus n.
- A fabulous being of antiquity, said to have had a hundred eyes, who has placed by Juno to guard Io. His eyes were transplanted to the peacock's tail.
- overwrought p. p.
- Wrought upon excessively; overworked; overexcited.
- distraught p. p.
- Torn asunder; separated. [OE. distract, distrauht. See Distract, a.]
- whereof adv.
- Of which; of whom; formerly, also, with which; -- used relatively.
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Sleep is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Project Gutenberg ebook #1365; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Sleep, in The Complete Poetical Works (1839–1882), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #1365, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/longfellow-poems/sleep.html, id L17750.
Form and metre
Sleep is 14 lines in a single stanza. It rhymes ABBAABBACDECDE, the pattern of the Italian sonnet. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 89%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 9.9 syllables. 50% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other Italian sonnets, other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABBAABBACDECDE soundA · caughtB · thoughtB · profoundA · boundA · overwroughtB · distraughtB · crownedA · cheekC · releasedD · breathE · greekC · feastD · deathE
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| Lull me to sleep, ye winds, whose fitful sound | 10 | ·······/˘· |
| Seems from some faint Aeolian harp-string caught; | 9 | ········· |
| Seal up the hundred wakeful eyes of thought | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| As Hermes with his lyre in sleep profound | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| The hundred wakeful eyes of Argus bound; | 10 | ·/˘/˘··/˘· |
| For I am weary, and am overwrought | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| With too much toil, with too much care distraught, | 10 | ········˘/ |
| And with the iron crown of anguish crowned. | 9 | ···/··/˘· |
| Lay thy soft hand upon my brow and cheek, | 10 | ·········· |
| O peaceful Sleep! until from pain released | 10 | ·/˘·····˘/ |
| I breathe again uninterrupted breath! | 9 | ··˘/·˘/˘· |
| Ah, with what subtile meaning did the Greek | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Call thee the lesser mystery at the feast | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Whereof the greater mystery is death! | 9 | ···/˘/˘·· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.