When once the twilight locks no longer <br />Locked in the long worm of my finger <br />Nor damned the sea that sped about my fist, <br />The mouth of time sucked, like a sponge, <br />The milky acid on each hinge, <br />And swallowed dry the waters of the breast. <br /> <br />When the galactic sea was sucked <br />And all the dry seabed unlocked, <br />I sent my creature scouting on the globe, <br />That globe itself of hair and bone <br />That, sewn to me by nerve and brain, <br />Had stringed my flask of matter to his rib. <br /> <br />My fuses are timed to charge his heart, <br />He blew like powder to the light <br />And held a little sabbath with the sun, <br />But when the stars, assuming shape, <br />Drew in his eyes the straws of sleep <br />He drowned his father's magics in a dream. <br /> <br />All issue armoured, of the grave, <br />The redhaired cancer still alive, <br />The cataracted eyes that filmed their cloth; <br />Some dead undid their bushy jaws, <br />And bags of blood let out their flies; <br />He had by heart the Christ-cross-row of death. <br /> <br />Sleep navigates the tides of time; <br />The dry Sargasso of the tomb <br />Gives up its dead to such a working sea; <br />And sleep rolls mute above the beds <br />Where fishes' food is fed the shades <br />Who periscope through flowers to the sky. <br /> <br />When once the twilight screws were turned, <br />And mother milk was stiff as sand, <br />I sent my own ambassador to light; <br />By trick or chance he fell asleep <br />And conjured up a carcass shape <br />To rob me of my fluids in his heart. <br /> <br />Awake, my sleeper, to the sun, <br />A worker in the morning town, <br />And leave the poppied pickthank where he lies; <br />The fences of the light are down, <br />All but the briskest riders thrown <br />And worlds hang on the trees.<br /><br />Dylan Thomas<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/when-once-the-twilight-locks-no-longer/