Tradition and verse — not medical advice

Sleep-Stealer

Rabindranath Tagore, The Crescent Moon (1913, Macmillan and Company). Public domain.

Shown in author's own English -- not a translation we made.

Who stole sleep from baby's eyes? I must know.

Clasping her pitcher to her waist mother went to fetch water from the village near by.

It was noon. The children's playtime was over; the ducks in the pond were silent.

The shepherd boy lay asleep under the shadow of the banyan tree.

The crane stood grave and still in the swamp near the mango grove.

In the meanwhile the Sleep-stealer came and, snatching sleep from baby's eyes, flew away.

When mother came back she found baby travelling the room over on all fours.

Who stole sleep from our baby's eyes? I must know. I must find her and chain her up.

I must look into that dark cave, where, through boulders and scowling stones, trickles a tiny stream.

In plain words (ours, not the poet's): a mother playfully imagines chasing down the mischievous fairy who "stole" her baby's afternoon nap, searching every hiding place in the countryside to get that sleepiness back.

Why public domain: Tagore wrote The Crescent Moon in English himself, first published London 1913. US: pre-1929 publication, public domain in the US. Tagore died 1941; public domain in India (life + 60 years) since 2002.

Read the original in full

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