sleep, o gentle sleep,
nature’s soft nurse, steep senses
in forgetfulness
Adapted from:
O sleep, O gentle sleep,
Nature’s soft nurse, how have I frightened thee,
That thou no more will weigh my eyelids down,
And steep my senses in forgetfulness?
From Henry IV, Part II, Act III, Scene 1 by William Shakespeare.
Where Big Bill has King wonder where sleep has gone, I manage to haiku it into a short prayer of thankfulness as well as write a sentence where haiku is used as a verb.
Editing Bill and turning haiku into a gerund without making it ‘haikuing’ is a pretty good start for a muggy muggy morning the low country of South Carolina.
Let me say that I have felt hot and cold, dry and wet and all other forms of weather but walking out into a steamy, thick, warm muggy morning a mile from the Atlantic coast is to be hit in the face with a soggy smelly towel, but I digress.
But morning it is and waking up is the issue.
Owen Johnson wrote about waking up in his book, The Prodigious Hickey: A Lawrenceville Story (The Century, 1908) saying:
” … the air with its clamour from the belfry of the old gymnasium, but no one rises. There is half an hour until the gong sounds for breakfast, a long delicious half hour—the best half hour of the day or night to prolong under the covers.”
There is half an hour until the gong sounds for breakfast …
a long delicious half hour …
the best half hour of the day or night to prolong under the covers …
O sleep.
O gentle sleep.
Nature’s soft nurse.
O, how I do hate to get up in the morning.
Weigh my eyelids down.
Steep my senses in forgetfulness.
PS: Anyone who dares quote Hamlet back to me with his whiney To sleep—perchance to dream. Ay, there’s the rub … will be shot.
No Haiku For You 