When you're lying awake
with a dismal headache
and repose is taboo'd
by anxiety
I conceive you may use
any language you choose
to indulge in
without impropriety
For your brain is on fire
the bedclothes conspire
of usual slumber
to plunder you
First your counterpane
goes, and uncovers
your toes, and your
sheet slips demurely
from under you
Then the blanketing
tickles, you feel like
mixed pickles
so terribly sharp
is the prickling
And you're hot and
you're cross and you
tumble and toss till
there's nothing 'twixt
you and the ticking
Then the bedclothes
all creep to the ground
in a heap, and you pick
'em all up in a tangle
Next your pillow resigns
and politely declines
to remain at it's
usual angle!
Well you get some
respose in the form
of a doze with hot
eyeballs and head
ever aching
But your slumbering
teems with such
horrible dreams
that you'd very much
better be waking
For you dream you are
crossing the Channel
and tossing about in a
steamer from Harwich
Which is something
between a large
bathing machine
and a very small
second-class carriage
And you're giving a treat
penny ice and cold meat
to a party of friends
and relations
They're a ravenous horde
and they all came on
board at Sloane Square
and South Kensington
Stations
And bound on that
journey you find
your attorney
who started that
morning from Devon
He's a bit undersiz'd
and you don't feel
surprised when he tells
you he's only eleven
When you're driving
like mad with this
singular lad by-the-by
the ship's now
a four-wheeler
And you're playing
round games, and he
calls you bad names
and you tell him that
"ties pay the dealer"
But this you can't stand
so you throw up your
hand, and you find
you're as cold
as an icicle
In your shirt and your
socks, the black silk
with gold clocks
crossing Sal'sbury Plain
on a bicycle
And he and the crew
are on bicycles too
which they've somehow
or other invested in
And he's telling the tars
of the particulars
of a company
he's interested in
It's a scheme of devices
to get at low prices
all goods from cough
mixtures to cables
Which tickled the sailors
by treating retailers
as though they were
all vegetables
You get a good
spadesman
to plant a small tradesman
first take off his boots
with a boot-tree
And his legs will take root
and his fingers will shoot
and they'll blossom and
bud like a fruit-tree
From the greengrocer
tree you get grapes
and green pea,
cauliflower, pineapple
and cranberries
While the pastry cook
plant, cherry brandy
will grant, apple, puffs
and three-corners
and Banburys
The shares are a penny
and ever so many
are taken by Rothschild
and Baring
And just as a few
are allotted to you
you awake with a
shudder despairing
You're a regular wreck
with a crick in your neck
and no wonder you snore
for your head's
on the floor
And you've needles and
pins from your soles to
your shins and your
flesh is a-creep, for
your left leg's asleep
And you've cramp in
your toes, and a fly on
your nose and some
fluff in your lung
and a feverish tongue
And a thirst that's intense
and a general sense
that you haven't been
sleeping in clover
But the darkness has
passed and it's daylight
at last and the night
has been long
ditto, ditto my song
And thank goodness
they're both of them
over!