The Sleep-Worker
6/2/1840-1/11/1928
When wilt thou wake, O Mother, wake and see -
As one who, held in trance, has laboured long
By vacant rote and prepossession strong -
The coils that thou hast wrought unwittingly;
Wherein have place, unrealized by thee,
Fair growths, foul cankers, right enmeshed with wrong,
Strange orchestras of victim-shriek and song,
And curious blends of ache and ecstasy? -
Should that morn come, and show thy opened eyes
All that Life's palpitating tissues feel,
How wilt thou bear thyself in thy surprise? -
Wilt thou destroy, in one wild shock of shame,
Thy whole high heaving firmamental frame,
Or patiently adjust, amend, and heal?
DayPoems Poem No. 1026
<a href="http://www.daypoems.net/poems/1026.html">The Sleep-Worker by Thomas Hardy</a>
The DayPoems Poetry Collection, www.daypoems.net
Timothy Bovee, editor
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