Sonnet Lvii. To Sleep.

COME, Sleep — Oblivion's sire! Come, blessed Sleep! Thy shadowy sheltering wings above me spread. Fold to thy balmy breast my weary head. Shut close behind the gates of sense, and steep All sad remembrance in thy Lethe deep. But come not as thou comest to the bed Of the tired laborer sleeping like the dead In dull and dreamless trance. But let me keep The visionary paths of fantasy Down through the mystic mazes of a land Transfigured by thy wonder-working spell. So lead me, gentle Sleep, with guiding hand, That when I wake from dreams, I still may be Wooed back to tread thy fields of asphodel.