On a summer’s day, Ann enters a silent, cool house and immediately feels she must creep, as though the whole place were asleep. When she opens a door, she finds her mother asleep in a chair, head bowed and hands loose in her lap. At first the sight is peaceful: sleep seems to smooth away every worry, and her mother looks calm and fair. But the longer Ann watches, the more uncanny the stillness becomes. Her mother’s closed eyes seem, somehow, to rest on Ann, and even her hands appear saturated with sleep. A cloudlike dread steals over the girl, and she tiptoes out again on mouselike feet. The mood is hushed, dreamlike, and faintly eerie—calm on the surface, but uneasy underneath.
The Sleeper — Summary
As Ann came in one summer's day, She felt that she must creep, So silent was the clear cool house, It seemed a house of sleep. And sure, when she pushed open the door, Rapt in the stillness there, Her mother sat, with stooping head, Asleep upon a chair; Fast--fast asleep; her two hands laid Loose-folded on her knee, So that her small unconscious face Looked half unreal to be: So calmly lit with sleep's pale light Each feature was; so fair Her forehead--every trouble was Smooth'd out beneath her hair. But though her mind in dream now moved, Still seemed her gaze to rest From out beneath her fast-sealed lids, Above her moving breast, On Ann, as quite, quite still she stood; Yet slumber lay so deep Even her hands upon her lap Seemed saturate with sleep. And as Ann peeped, a cloudlike dread Stole over her, and then, On stealthy, mouselike feet she trod, And tiptoed out again.