The Joys Of Waking After S.T. Coleridge The Pains Of Sleep Poem by Jonathan ROBIN

When from camp bed cramp limbs I raise,
I never hesitate to praise
Lord Luck, loud laud and by degrees
attain crescendo! Nor bent knees,
nor moving lips, dumb witness lay
with supplication night or day,
convinced Fate’s finger points to please.

No reverential resignation
may undermine anticipation,
wish ill conceived, thought un expressed,
defensive mind-set, wants supressed.
Nowhere there’s sense of supplication,
for boundless strength spurns condemnation,
strength weakness spurns, by Fate twice blessed.

No shapes and thoughts some others see
in anguish and in agony,
up-starting from some fiendish crowd
of rued regrets bewailed aloud,
spoil waking moments which new dawn
should welcome, hibernation torn.
No nightmares bets hedged, lead head bowed.

Ignoring sense of painful wrong
lights lurid, frightful trampling throng,
for rights I fight forthrightfully
weave justice into equity.
Desires with loathing strangely mixed,
on threatening fearful neighbours fixed,
are strangers, foreigners for me;

The clock of optimism ticks
to scorn manipulative tricks,
thirst for revenge with powerless will
allied both baffled, burning, still
are absent from life’s waking leap
as from soft coverlets eyes peep
at fresh ambitions to fulfill.

Though aims stay hidden, flames are bid
to temper soul’s steel, conquering Cid
fools suffers not, time spilt, guilt, woe,
all banished by the will to know
without confusion, waste of time,
the causal links that tune life’s chime
through strings slave puppet daren’t o’erthrow.

Some toss, nights lost, to vain dismay,
sad, stunted, stunned, numbed, waking day
fear to embrace. Electron free
on waves chromatic, joyfully,
I would advance from sleep to greet
sustained success, triumph complete,
repudiating apathy.

Some treat quite as catastrophe
night’s spite, when haunting phantoms free
range till cock’s crow wakes from dream’s page
strange sufferings which teem and rage
as migraine’s over-riding theme
denying sunshine’s balmy beam,
convicts convinced by self-made cage.

Such punishments, I say, seem due
to twisted natures who simmer, stew
in their own fiery hell within
nocturnal sin sweat, fear to win.
Few slumber sound who can’t dispell
past problems from sleep tidal swell,
solutions positive can’t spin.

Greet each day’s play with heart unbound,
send spirits soaring, life’s then found
to know no horrors, aims unmet,
grief-laden, puffy lids tear wet.
Whet appetite ambitious, fresh,
with surge momentous, motives mesh
succeed seed, speed feed freed, not fret.

Life’s griefs on which most men agree,
will never, never fall on me,
to be beloved is all I need,
and whom I love, I love indeed.
I lose no sleep, solutions find
as wants with actions are combined
refreshed uniting thought and deed.