{
 "id": "william-carlos-williams/a-goodnight",
 "title": "A Goodnight",
 "poet": "William Carlos Williams",
 "poet_slug": "william-carlos-williams",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Sour Grapes: A Book of Poems",
 "book_slug": "sour-grapes",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 6,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1921,
  "venue": "Sour Grapes: A Book of Poems (1921)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35667"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/william-carlos-williams_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31878",
   "https://archive.org/details/temperscarlos00willrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51997",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/006060238",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35667",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/007676947"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 56,
  "n_stanzas": 5,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 59,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Go to sleep⁠—though of course you will not⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "to tideless waves thundering slantwise against",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "strong embankments, rattle and swish of spray",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "dashed thirty feet high, caught by the lake wind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "scattered and strewn broadcast in over the steady",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "car rails! Sleep, sleep! Gulls’ cries in a wind-gust",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "broken by the wind; calculating wings set above",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the field of waves breaking.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Go to sleep to the lunge between foam-crests,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "refuse churned in the recoil. Food! Food!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Offal! Offal! that holds them in the air, wave-white",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "for the one purpose, feather upon feather, the wild",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "chill in their eyes, the hoarseness in their voices⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "sleep, sleep⁠ ⁠…",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Gentlefooted crowds are treading out your lullaby.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their arms nudge, they brush shoulders,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "hitch this way then that, mass and surge at the crossings⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "lullaby, lullaby! The wild-fowl police whistles,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the enraged roar of the traffic, machine shrieks:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "it is all to put you to sleep,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "to soften your limbs in relaxed postures,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and that your head slip sidewise, and your hair loosen",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and fall over your eyes and over your mouth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "brushing your lips wistfully that you may dream,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "sleep and dream⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "A black fungus springs out about lonely church doors⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "sleep, sleep. The Night, coming down upon",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the wet boulevard, would start you awake with his",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "message, to have in at your window. Pay no",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "heed to him. He storms at your sill with",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "cooings, with gesticulations, curses!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You will not let him in. He would keep you from sleeping.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He would have you sit under your desk lamp",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "brooding, pondering; he would have you",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "slide out the drawer, take up the ornamented dagger",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and handle it. It is late, it is nineteen-nineteen⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "go to sleep, his cries are a lullaby;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "his jabbering is a sleep-well-my-baby; he is",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "a crackbrained messenger.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The maid waking you in the morning",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "when you are up and dressing,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the rustle of your clothes as you raise them⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "it is the same tune.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At table the cold, greenish, split grapefruit, its juice",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "on the tongue, the clink of the spoon in",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "your coffee, the toast odors say it over and over.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The open street-door lets in the breath of",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the morning wind from over the lake.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The bus coming to a halt grinds from its sullen brakes⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "lullaby, lullaby. The crackle of a newspaper,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the movement of the troubled coat beside you⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "sleep, sleep, sleep, sleep⁠ ⁠…",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It is the sting of snow, the burning liquor of",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the moonlight, the rush of rain in the gutters packed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "with dead leaves: go to sleep, go to sleep.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the night passes⁠—and never passes⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}