Irresistible Sleep

 

I didn’t want to go to sleep

There was something I had to finish

But the more I thought about it

The more my senses diminished.

I looked up toward the clock

It was close to the end of the day,

I would put sleep off if I only could

But it appears I had no say.

My eyelids began to close

I literally tried to prize them open

But all I tried I just could not

It seemed a higher voice had spoken.

O how I wished I could finish

This task I had set myself

But wishing never got things done

Didn’t matter how sincere the pledge.

The truth of the matter really is

I could have accomplished this task

But when it was light I did otherwise

Now a few minutes more is all I ask.

Pen in my hand I struggled to write

As the words started coming to me,

They flowed from my brain

But my eyes now closed I could not see.

With one last resolve I tried again

If only I could open my eyes

But the lids clamped tight as in a vice

One, two, three, four tries.

The brain counted; the thoughts flowed

The fingers refused to write,

Slumber came and overpowered me

It was just about midnight.

Twenty-four hours in a given day

With lots of time to complete

But so many things vie for that time

For that time they all compete.

  

A feeble effort at prioritising

One that wasn’t near its best,

A frantic effort to fit tasks within

No wonder I failed time’s test.

An order I juggled and rearranged

As demands upon me pressed,

A wish at intervals throughout the day

To take a well deserved rest.

A little time for the mundane stuff

Well, more than a little in fact,

Caught up in a movie, two hours or so

Or listened to music track after track.

More time than planned

Spent old talking with a friend

From one topic to another

And just could not find the end.

A lunch hour that simply became two

More like two and a half to three,

A while to reflect on the little done

Like simply gazing out to sea.

Oh but I must be up and doing

Suddenly the realization strikes home

But alas most of the day is already spent

Now the problem is full blown.

So little time we are apt to complain

But is that really the case?

Wasted time is gone forever

And that time can never be replaced.

And now the day is far spent

Daylight has long gone its way,

One more task I wished I had done

But today was just not my day.

An unfinished task, maybe two or three

Confront me at the end of the day,

Remorse it seems as sleep engulfs

But a repeat is inevitably on the way.

Such is the case of our daily lives

Though opportunity beckons each day

But time will run out for each of us

If the Lord tarries we should say.

No next day to complete a task

This sleep will be different from the rest,

No efforts at opening up the eyes

‘Twill be the end of life and all its zest.

Stewart Russell © October 2017