THE AWAKENING

By Edgar Lee Masters

When you lie sleeping; golden hair

Tossed on your pillow, sea shell pink

Ears that nestle, I forbear

A moment while I look and think

How you are mine, and if I dare

To bend and kiss you lying there.

A Raphael in the flesh! Resist

I cannot, though to break your sleep

Is thoughtless of me — you are kissed

And roused from slumber dreamless, deep —

You rub away the slumber's mist,

You scold and almost weep.

It is too bad to wake you so,

Just for a kiss. But when awake

You sing and dance, nor seem to know

You slept a sleep too deep to break

From which I roused you long ago

For nothing but my passion's sake —

What though your heart should ache!