To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

Alone, one afternoon I read

The tales that Ovid used to thread

Of girls and boys and birds and bees

And all their metamorphoses.

But when I found his words too deep

I drifted gently off to sleep -

To sleep, to die, perchance to dream

A dream is all that it may seem,

But dreams are dreams, as love is love

The both of which come from above.

Thus did I find myself upon

The road, I think, to Avalon

For Avalon it must have been

As such a garden ne'er was seen

With fruit and flower of every kind

And not an one was yet maligned.

Methought this could be paradise,

But paradise -

I feared the price.

The price

The price -

The cost to stay

Perhaps it's best to stay away

For there I was somewhere between

The garden and where'er I'd been -

Where'er I'd been I do not know

I think it had been pleasant though

And thus I wavered for a while

On how in this there could be guile

With some distrust I looked around

For any signs that could be found.

The name engraved and glistening

That bid me there to enter in

Was raised above the entrance way

According to the old cliche:

The Isle Pomorum welcomes you

It said, but with an evil hue

At least, it so appeared to me

Inspiring the urge to flee.

But looking 'round I could not find

A reason for my state of mind,

For though the sign had made me quake

I longed that i might still partake

Partake -

It seemed a hopeless dream

A dream, to die, to sleep, to seem

But yet abounding did I see

No knowledge grown on bough or tree

Nor good or evil fruit was there

To tempt or otherwise ensnare

Not even was a flaming sword

Aglow campaigning for its ward

And as I sought that one last thing

I saw the most appealing spring

Which glistened as it flowed along

And was to me a siren's song.

But still I wavered at the gate

And shrunk to enter the estate

When all at once, like Socrates,

I heard a voice speak on the breeze

Or in my mind, I cannot tell,

But to my heart its message fell

And from that place I felt to run

To run -

It glistened in the sun.

I walked along the garden's edge

Surrounded by a little hedge

But kept my eyes upon the spring

To listen to the sirens sing.

Approaching with delight I saw

The hedge upon the spring did draw

And as I reached this blessed spot

All prior warnings I forgot.

Enthralled by such a priceless scene

A place no man had ever been

My gaze just then did fall upon

The loveliest flower in Avalon:

A lily at the river's side

With starry gaze my gaze espied

And there I stood from hour to hour

In worship of that sacred flower

Until at last I heard her call

To me as eve began to fall.

Then to my horror and dismay

That one last thing came out to pray

To prey upon my holy shrine

'round which he did himself entwine

'ere I could my beloved save

The fiend had sent her to the grave

And from my grasp he did escape

Delighting in his fruitful rape.

I knelt where she, now broken, lay

And raised her as my lips did say:

Talitha, please, I beg, cumi -

Then from my dream I was set free.

______________________________

Probably need some revision, but let me know what you think first, if it makes sense, etc. This is a Chaucerian trope.

Copyright © 2010 by Layne Cockcroft

All Rights Reserved