… Wordsworth as he tossed and turned and counted sheep, perhaps after a rollicking New Year’s Eve party.  Hope you got some sleep once the brand new decade had dawned.  Maybe reciting William’s poem can give you “fresh thoughts and joyous health!” in 2020.

To Sleep

 

William Wordsworth (1770–1850)

 

A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by

One after one; the sound of rain, and bees

Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas,

Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky;—

 

I’ve thought of all by turns, and still I lie

Sleepless; and soon the small birds’ melodies

Must hear, first utter’d from my orchard trees,

And the first cuckoo’s melancholy cry.

 

Even thus last night, and two nights more I lay,

And could not win thee, Sleep! by any stealth:

So do not let me wear to-night away:

 

Without Thee what is all the morning’s wealth?

Come, blessed barrier between day and day,

Dear mother of fresh thoughts and joyous health!

 

°°°°°°°°°°°°∇°°°°°°°°°°°°

 

William Wordsworth, born April 7, 1770, Cockermouth, Cumberland, England—died April 23, 1850, Rydal Mount, Westmorland, English poet whose Lyrical Ballads (1798), written with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped launch the English Romantic movement.

Encyclopædia Britannica an absorbing article written by Stephen Maxfield Parrish

♥ Gretchen Bernet-Ward