Famous Fall Asleep Poems by Famous Poets

These are examples of famous Fall Asleep poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous fall asleep poems. These examples illustrate what a famous fall asleep poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).

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A Summer Afternoon

...some poor dove . . . Why, I can scarcely keep
My heavy eyelids--there it is again--
"Coo-coo!"--I mustn't--"Coo-coo!"--fall asleep!...Read more of this...
by Riley, James Whitcomb


A Sweltering Day In Australia

...flies; 

Sweet Nangwarry's desolate, Coonamble wails, 
And Tungkillo Kuito in sables is drest, 
For the Whangerei winds fall asleep in the sails 
And the Booleroo life-breeze is dead in the west. 

Mypongo, Kapunda, O slumber no more 
Yankalilla, Parawirra, be warned 
There's death in the air! 
Killanoola, wherefore 
Shall the prayer of Penola be scorned? 

Cootamundra, and Takee, and Wakatipu, 
Toowoomba, Kaikoura are lost 
From Onkaparinga to far Oamaru 
All burn in this he...Read more of this...
by Twain, Mark

A Womans Last Word

...ll be to-morrow
 Not to-night:
I must bury sorrow
 Out of sight:

 X.

—Must a little weep, Love,
 (Foolish me!)
And so fall asleep, Love,
 Loved by thee....Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert

All Night

...free fall, 
while the lettuce in the refrigerator 
succumbs to its brown killer. 
And in the novel I put down 
before I fall asleep, 
the paneled walls of a room 
are condemned to stand and wait 
for tomorrow, when I'll get to the page 
where the prisoner finds the secret door 
and steps into air and the scent of lilacs....Read more of this...
by Mueller, Lisel

Atalantas Race

...e;
And on that day my heart and limbs so tire,
With utmost strain and measureless desire,
That, at the worst, I may but fall asleep
When in the sunlight round that sword shall sweep. "

He went therewith, nor anywhere would bide,
But unto Argos restlessly did wend;
And there, as one who lays all hope aside,
Because the leech has said his life must end,
Silent farewell he bade to foe and friend, 
And took his way unto the restless sea, 
For there he deemed his rest and help mi...Read more of this...
by Morris, William


Endymion: Book IV

...ot be thy hand, and yet it is;
And this is sure thine other softling--this
Thine own fair bosom, and I am so near!
Wilt fall asleep? O let me sip that tear!
And whisper one sweet word that I may know
This is this world--sweet dewy blossom!"--Woe!
Woe! Woe to that Endymion! Where is he?--
Even these words went echoing dismally
Through the wide forest--a most fearful tone,
Like one repenting in his latest moan;
And while it died away a shade pass'd by,
As of a thunder cloud. Wh...Read more of this...
by Keats, John

From the Antique

...in all the world, 
How much less would care or weep: 
I should be nothing, while all the rest 
Would wake and weary and fall asleep....Read more of this...
by Rossetti, Christina

Girl

...ad feelings. 
She said that night reminds her of a cool hand 
placed gently across her fevered brow, said 
she likes to fall asleep beneath the stars, 
that their streaks of light make her believe 
that she too is going somewhere. Infinity, 
she whispers as she closes her eyes, 
descending into thin air, where no arms 
outstretch to catch her. 

Originally published in Magaera, Spring 2005.
Copyright © Lisa Zaran, 2005...Read more of this...
by Zaran, Lisa

Little Sleeps-Head Sprouting Hair in the Moonlight

...e the ashes of your cradle back into wood,
I would let nothing of you go, ever,

until washerwomen
feel the clothes fall asleep in their hands,
and hens scratch their spell across hatchet blades,
and rats walk away from the cultures of the plague,
and iron twists weapons toward the true north,
and grease refuses to slide in the machinery of progress,
and men feel as free on earth as fleas on the bodies of men,
and lovers no longer whisper to the presence beside them...Read more of this...
by Kinnell, Galway

Love Sonnet XVII

...: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep....Read more of this...
by Neruda, Pablo

Monna Innominata: A Sonnet of Sonnets

...will bring.
Life wanes; and when love folds his wings above
Tired hope, and less we feel his conscious pulse,
Let us go fall asleep, dear friend, in peace:
A little while, and age and sorrow cease;
A little while, and life reborn annuls
Loss and decay and death, and all is love. 


11 

Vien dietro a me e lascia dir le genti. - Dante
Contando i casi della vita nostra. - Petrarca

Many in aftertimes will say of you
"He lov'd her"--while of me what will they say?
Not that I lov...Read more of this...
by Rossetti, Christina

Music

...is still.
Then, like a weary child that loves to keep
Locked in its arms some treasure,
Thy soul in calm content shall fall asleep,
And so forget, forget.

Forget, forget,--
And if thou hast been weeping,
Let go the thoughts that bind thee to thy grief:
Lie still, and watch the singing angels, reaping
The golden harvest of thy sorrow, sheaf by sheaf;
Or count thy joys like flocks of snow-white sheep
That one by one come creeping
Into the quiet fold, until thou sleep,
And so ...Read more of this...
by Dyke, Henry Van

My Last Will

...these for endless riot 
Broken by a single rest? 
Well you know that sleep is best. 

We that have been heart to heart 
Fall asleep, and drift apart. 
Will that overwhelming tide 
Reunite us, or divide? 
Whence we come and whither go 
None can tell us, but I know 
Passion's self is often marred 
By a kind of self-regard, 
And the torture of the cry 
"You are you, and I am I." 
While we live, the waking sense 
Feeds upon our difference, 
In our passion and our pride 
Not unite...Read more of this...
by Raleigh, Sir Walter

Nocturne Of Remembered Spring

...have said
Some intuition that flew too deep,
And struck a plageant chord.
Tonight, tonight you will remember it as you fall asleep,
Your dream will suddenly blossom with sharp delight,
Goodnight! You say.
The leaves of the lilac dip and sway;
The purple spikes of bloom
Nod their sweetness upon us, lift again,
Your white face turns, I am cought with pain
And silence descends, and dripping of dew from eaves,
And jeweled points of leaves. 

IV. 

I walk in a pleasure of sorrow ...Read more of this...
by Aiken, Conrad

Orpheus with his Lute Made Trees

...the billows of the sea,
Hung their heads, and then lay by.
In sweet music is such art,
Killing care and grief of heart
Fall asleep, or hearing, die....Read more of this...
by Shakespeare, William

Part 8 of Trout Fishing in America

...it of trout within an hour of reaching Hell-

diver, and my woman, in all the excitement of good fishing,

let the baby fall asleep directly in the sun and when the baby

woke up, she puked and I carried her back down the trail.

 My woman trailed silently behind, carrying the rods and

the fish. The baby puked a couple more times, thimblefuls

of gentle lavender vomit, but still it got on my clothes, and

her face was hot and flushed.

 We stopped at Mushroom Springs. I gave...Read more of this...
by Brautigan, Richard

The Moose

...n and on,
dim lamplight in the hall,
down in the kitchen, the dog
tucked in her shawl.

Now, it's all right now
even to fall asleep
just as on all those nights.
--Suddenly the bus driver
stops with a jolt,
turns off his lights.

A moose has come out of 
the impenetrable wood
and stands there, looms, rather,
in the middle of the road.
It approaches; it sniffs at
the bus's hot hood.

Towering, antlerless,
high as a church,
homely as a house
(or, safe as houses).
A man's voice a...Read more of this...
by Bishop, Elizabeth

The Song of the Shirt

...rk 
Till the eyes are heavy and dim! 
Seam, and gusset, and band, 
Band, and gusset, and seam, 
Till over the buttons I fall asleep, 
And sew them on in a dream!

"Oh, Men, with Sisters dear! 
Oh, Men, with Mothers and Wives! 
It is not linen you're wearing out, 
But human creatures' lives! 
Stitch — stitch — stitch, 
In poverty, hunger, and dirt, 
Sewing at once with a double thread, 
A Shroud as well as a Shirt.

But why do I talk of Death? 
That Phantom of grisly bone, 
I ...Read more of this...
by Hood, Thomas

When the Dark Comes Down

...rass a silver crown,
The lads and lassies wander when the dark comes down. 

When the dark comes down, oh, the children fall asleep,
And mothers in the fisher huts their happy vigils keep;
There's music in the song they sing and music on the sea, 
The loving, lingering echoes of the twilight's litany,
For toil has folded hands to dream, and care has ceased to frown,
And every wave's a lyric when the dark comes down....Read more of this...
by Montgomery, Lucy Maud

XVII (I do not love you...)

...is: where I does not exist, nor you,
so close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
so close that your eyes close as I fall asleep....Read more of this...
by Neruda, Pablo

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