Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, SONNET: EGYPT, by THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH



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SONNET: EGYPT, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: Fantastic sleep is busy with my eyes
Last Line: Is shut in the rosy outstretched hand of dawn.
Subject(s): Dreams; Egypt; Nightmares


FANTASTIC Sleep is busy with my eyes:
I seem in some waste solitude to stand
Once ruled of Cheops: upon either hand
A dark illimitable desert lies,
Sultry and still -- a realm of mysteries;
A wide-browed Sphinx, half buried in the sand,
With orbless sockets stares across the land,
The woefulest thing beneath these brooding skies,
Where all is woeful, weird-lit vacancy.
'T is neither midnight, twilight, nor moonrise.
Lo! while I gaze, beyond the vast sand-sea
The nebulous clouds are downward slowly drawn,
And one bleared star, faint-glimmering like a bee,
Is shut in the rosy outstretched hand of Dawn.





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