THE SLEEP-WORKER
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
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
Thomas Hardy - Poems of the Past and Present
