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Through Sleepy-Land

By James Whitcomb Riley

Topics: classic

Where do you go when you go to sleep,      Little Boy! Little Boy! where?     'Way - 'way in where's Little Bo-Peep,     And Little Boy Blue, and the Cows and Sheep      A-wandering 'way in there; - in there -         A-wandering 'way in there!     And what do you see when lost in dreams,      Little Boy, 'way in there?     Firefly-glimmers and glowworm-gleams,     And silvery, low, slow-sliding streams,      And mermaids, smiling out - 'way in where         They're a-hiding - 'way in there!     Where do you go when the Fairies call,      Little Boy! Little Boy! where?     Wade through the clews of the grasses tall,     Hearing the weir and the waterfall      And the Wee Folk - 'way in there - in there -         And the Kelpies - 'way in there!     And what do you do when you wake at dawn,      Little Boy! Little Boy! what?     Hug my Mommy and kiss her on     Her smiling eyelids, sweet and wan,      And tell her everything I've forgot      About, a-wandering 'way in there -         Through the blind-world 'way in there!

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"Where do you go when you go to sleep,..."

"Through Sleepy-Land" is a quintessential example of James Whitcomb Riley's signature style... ### Why We Love This Line At Linespedia, we believe that poetry is the ultimate sanctuary for the soul...

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Author:James Whitcomb Riley

"Where do you go when you go to sleep,..." by James Whitcomb Riley

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"The Text is taken from Percy's Reliques (1765), vol. i. p. 71, 'given from two MS. copies, transmitted from Scotland.' Herd had a very similar bal"

James Whitcomb Riley

About James Whitcomb Riley

James Whitcomb Riley (1849–1916) was an American poet known as the "Hoosier Poet." His dialect poems—including "Little Orphant Annie" and "When the Frost Is on the Punkin"—celebrate rural Indiana life and childhood nostalgia.

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