Etude to Sleep
These days my evenings are spent with my little ones, hunting for the illusive doorway that guards their passage between wake and sleep. Time twists and turns, hours vanishing in our search. Elusive, evasive, how their little bodies scream and scramble from bed to bed, in and out and over and under, onto the floor and into the air they dance their song of resistance. Howls echo off the walls, screams and laughter crash and resonate through the air. Experimentations in sound, bouncing vibrations and curious faces. Giggles abound, mirroring between the two of them, and daring songs in tiny voices that warm my listening heart with wonder. Energy, boundless bouncing energy, bouncing, banging on the wall, banging, bouncing off the walls: Where does all this energy come from? And who summoned it so, at bedtime?
Where is the sweetness of the night that lures our softened eyes to sleep, gentle, love, that calls to us? Darkness has already drawn the light out of the room, and yet it’s in and out of bed and into bed once more. I call to their minds to soothe their small bodies as we recollect memories of our days and slowly welcome the night that surrounds us: moonlight and creatures of the night, we call to you to soothe us. We sing to you. We open to the night, and leave the glare of the light of day behind. Details begin to shift and blur, the energy dissipates as we drift into another frame of mind. Gentle now, for these little hearts that love so freely, how they hate to leave this world of the waking and drift away into sleep. Mother’s voice is singing now. Softly, softly, with kisses that shore’d us onto the bank of sleep, drifting into the mists that shroud the mind, heads drift gently onto the pillows one final time, little fingers that curl around small creature comforts and then gently, gently, eyes that close, how softly do they drift away.
It happens at the same moment, ere they go. I can tangibly feel the moment that sleep settles into the room. It is there with us. One moment we are calling and calling and it never seems to come, and then suddenly it is here, settled amidst us, and they are asleep and the day is over. A few whimpers of a dream, perhaps, else all is quiet. The warm, soft rise and fall of our breaths within our bodies. The gentle glow of the night light in the corner. The serenity of peaceful sleeping bodies and the warm hum that resonates between us. Other-worldly, within this world. There is beauty here. Something sacred, something still. Slumber that holds space for dreams, in the warm comfort of blankets. Good night, sleep tight, my darling ones, the moon is on the rise.