T.S. Eliot For Sleep || Grounded Sleep Podcast Episode 36

Welcome to the Grounded Sleep Podcast! You don't have to do anything except get into bed, close your eyes, and allow David to guide you into a deep, peaceful rest. Enjoy letting go of the day, quieting all the mental noise, and going back to that primordial place of stillness that is calling you back.

Transcript

Hey,

Friend.

Good evening.

Welcome back to the Grounded Sleep Podcast.

I'm David,

And I'm going to be your guide tonight,

And it is my privilege to help you fall asleep,

Let go of the day,

And have a really great rest.

If this is your first time falling asleep with me,

Welcome.

And if you've been here a few hundred or a few thousand times before,

Welcome back.

Get into bed with your jammies on or whatever you wear to bed.

Turn off all the lights.

Get nice and comfortable.

And just recognize that falling asleep is a very sacred experience.

And allow it to be a very relaxing one.

Because relaxation is really the doorway to sleep.

And to help you relax tonight,

I have one of my favorite poems from T.

S.

Elliot.

I actually want to start by just reading a few lines of the poem that are towards the end.

And then I'll read the entire poem.

And you'll hear it again.

But I think these words are so powerful,

I want to make sure you hear them before you nod off.

And if you've already nodded off,

Well,

Congratulations.

So with your eyes closed,

Take a few long,

Deep breaths.

Ease any tension in your body.

Allow the night to start to call you.

And let gravity just start to pull you down into your bed.

This poem is called Little Gidding by T.

S.

Elliot.

And these are the words I wanted to start with.

We shall not cease from exploration,

And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started,

And know the place for the first time.

Through the unknown,

Unremembered gate,

When the last of the earth left to discover is that which was the beginning,

At the source of the longest river.

The voice of the hidden waterfall,

And the children in the apple tree.

Little Gidding.

Midwinter spring is its own season.

Deep eternal though sodden towards sundown,

Suspended in time between pole and tropic.

When the short day is brightest with the frost and fire,

The brief sun flames the ice on pond and ditches in windless cold that is the heart's heat.

Reflecting in a watery mirror,

A glare that is blindness in the early afternoon,

And glow more intense than blaze of branch or brazier,

Stirs the dumb spirit no wind,

But Pentecostal fire in the dark time of the year.

Between melting and freezing,

The soul's sap quivers.

There's no earth smell or smell of living thing.

This is the springtime,

But not in time's covenant.

Now the hedge grow is blanched for an hour with transitory blossom of snow,

A bloom more sudden than that of summer,

Neither budding nor fading,

Not in the scheme of generation.

Where is the summer,

The unimaginable zero summer?

If you came in this way,

Taking the route you would be likely to take from the place you would be likely to come from.

If you came this way in May time,

You would find the hedges white again.

In May,

With the luxury sweetness,

You would be the same at the end of the journey.

If you came at night like a broken king,

If you came by day not knowing what you came for,

It would be the same.

When you leave the rough road and turn behind the pixie,

And turn behind the pix tie to the dull facade and the tombstone,

And what you thought you came for is only a shell,

A husk of meaning,

From which the purpose breaks only when it's fulfilled,

If at all.

Either you had no purpose,

Or the purpose is beyond the end you figured and is altered in fulfillment.

There are other places which also are the world's end,

Some at the sea jaws or over a dark lake,

In a desert or a city.

But this is the nearest in place and time,

Now and in England.

If you came this way,

Taking any route,

Starting from anywhere,

At any time or any season,

It would always be the same.

You would have put off sense and notion.

You are not here to verify,

Instruct yourself or inform curiosity or carry report.

You are here to kneel,

Where prayer has been valid,

And prayer is more than that order of words,

The conscious occupation of the praying mind,

Or the sound of the voice praying.

And what the dead had no speech for when living,

They can tell you.

Being dead,

The communication of the dead is tongued with fire,

Beyond the language of the living.

Here the intersection of the timeless moment is England,

And nowhere,

Never and always.

Ash on an old man's sleeve is all the ash the burnt roses leave.

Dust in the air suspended,

Marks the place where a story ended.

Just in breathed was a house,

The walls,

Wayne Scott and the mouse,

The death of hope and despair.

This is the death of air.

There are flood and drought over the eyes and in the mouth,

Dead water and dead sand contending for the upper hand.

The parched eviscerate soil,

Gapes at the vanity of toil.

Laughs without mirth,

This is the death of earth.

Water and fire succeed,

The town,

The pasture and the weed.

Water and fire deride the sacrifice that we denied.

Water and fire shall rot,

The marred foundations we forgot.

For sanctuary and choir,

This is the death of water and fire.

What we call the beginning is often the end,

And to make and end is to make a beginning.

The end is where we start from,

And every phrase and sentence that is right,

Where every word is at home,

Taking its place to support the others.

The word neither diffident nor ostentatious,

An easy commerce of the old and the new,

A common word exact without vulgarity,

The formal word precise but not pedantic,

The complete consort dancing together.

Every phase and every sentence is an end and a beginning,

Every poem an epitaph,

And any action is a step to the block,

To the fire,

Down the sea's throat or to an illegible stone,

And that is where we start.

We die with the dying,

See they depart and we go with them.

We are born with the dead,

See they return and bring us with them.

But the moment of the rose and the moment of the yew tree are of equal duration.

A people without history is not redeemed from time,

For history is a pattern of timeless moments.

So while the light fails on a winter's afternoon,

In a secluded chapel,

History is now and England.

With the drawing of this love and the voicing of this calling,

We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time,

Through the unknown,

Unremembered gate where the last of the earth left to discover is that which was the beginning.

At the source of the longest river,

The voice of the hidden waterfall and the children in the apple tree,

Not known because not looked for but heard,

Half heard in the stillness between two waves of the sea,

Quick now,

Here,

Now,

Always,

A condition of complete simplicity costing not less than everything,

And all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.

When the tongues of flames are enfolded into the crowded knot of fire and the fire and the rose are one.

Allow your breath to slowly deepen.

Allow yourself to drift off into sleep.

Let the night invite you into a deep rest.

Sleep deeply.

Sleep cleanly.

Sleep calmly.

And I'll see you on the other side.

Reviews

Loved this!!

I dosed off right away. I'm now wanting to know what the poem. I will listen again tonight.
Thank you.

Thank you 🙏 David 💗💗💗💗💗. I really enjoyed your reading the poem.
It’s not a poem I recall hearing before. I appreciate your diverse choices. I view you as a teacher and I value your choices to toss us something unusual to help us see different views and help us expand and grow. Thank you for expanding my horizons 😃
Great job David, you are awesome 👍🏻🤗🤗

Always good to listen to David. 🙏🏼❤️

I have no problem falling asleep, but my body insists on waking up at an obscenely early hour. So I’m here during this contemplative time. This poem is so rich in language and ideas I’ll have to listen several times to take it all in. I appreciate the reading 🙏🏻🙏🏻

Great voice and choice of poetry

Fantastic as usual! Really interesting topic, Tried to listen till the end, but fell 😴 asleep too soon!😜 good idea that you shared your favorite part first! great content, pacing, voice tonality😉

Amazing! Thank you! 🙏🙏🙏👼💕🌹⭐✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

Beautiful poem and a very nice soothing sleep meditation.

Absolutely lovely.