Half-Waking by William Allingham. Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. 1895. A Victorian Anthology, 1837-1895

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895.

Half-Waking

William Allingham (1824–89)


I THOUGHT it was the little bed
I slept in long ago;
A straight white curtain at the head,
And two smooth knobs below.

I thought I saw the nursery fire,	5
And in a chair well-known
My mother sat, and did not tire
With reading all alone.

If I should make the slightest sound
To show that I ’m awake,	10
She’d rise, and lap the blankets round,
My pillow softly shake;

Kiss me, and turn my face to see
The shadows on the wall,
And then sing “Rousseau’s Dream” to me,	15
Till fast asleep I fall.

But this is not my little bed;
That time is far away:
With strangers now I live instead,
From dreary day to day.	20