Give us the sleep of the innocent

Ahura Mazda, Artist Divine, thou didst divide the day into morn and noon, evening and night, and made waiting for active duties of life and sleep for timely repose. Thy Sraosha keep his vigil from dusk to dawn and we rest in his keeping, after the day's labor and work.

Many and marvelous are the bounties thou hast showered upon thy creatures and sweet is the sleep that sustains the beasts and the birds and mankind against fatigue. After the fret and fever of the day, kindly sleep restores our tired limbs, relieves languor, recruits strength, repairs the wastage of the body, and lubricates the cogs and wheels of the bodily machine. It recuperates the brain, refreshes the overwrought mind, distraught with care and anxiety, cures the troubles of the waking hours, confers respite from sorrow and gloom, brings healing to the wounded of heart, gives a soothing draught of forgetfulness of grief and misfortune, and affords a momentary escape from life when its hard realities press heavily upon us. Thus does it prepare us to shoulder the manifold duties of the dawning day.

Nestled like a child in its bed, steeps one the sleep of the innocent. When sleep steals over his body he drops to a heavy sleep the moment his head touches the pillow and sinks into sound sleep without nightmare or dream. Another lies twisting and turning all night in his bed, turning the events of the day in his mind. Anxiety and care chase away his sleep and he sleeps only in snatches. Yet another cannot sleep a wink, for he sleeps the sleep of the guilty. Long and late hours he lolls and lies in his bed to sleep off the effects of night's dissipation.

May thy Sraosha keep his watch over me and protect me while I sleep. May he help me to take my fill of peaceful sleep, that refreshed and anew, I may rise at the first streak of dawn to toil hard and with diligence for the furtherance of thy world of goodness, Mazda mine.

This page was last updated on Friday, February 11, 2005.