Drift off to sleep with Alone the Immortals by Lord Dunsany, a short, beautiful and deeply comforting prose poem about the years that have passed and where they go, read aloud by Martin Hewlett on Books at Bedtime, the sleep story series from Calming Anxiety.
The narrator has heard a rumour: that far away, beyond the deserts, in a country dedicated to winter, there is a hidden valley where all the years that have died are shut away, hidden from the world but not from the moon, nor from those who dream by its light. So he resolves to travel there by ways of dream, to mourn the good years that are gone and lay a wreath of sorrow at their feet.
But no flower seems frail enough for such an offering. The lily looks too large and the laurel too solemn, until at last he weaves a slender chain of daisies, the way he once saw a girl make one in a summer long ago. With his little wreath in hand, he follows paths of mystery to the moonlit valley, searching the grass for the poor, slight years he came to mourn. What he finds there is not at all what he expected.
The story
Transcribed from the audio, so the odd word may be off. Tap any line while it plays to keep the words in step with Martin's voice.
Books at bedtime by Calming Anxiety. Alone The Immortals by Lord Dunciny. I heard it said that far away from here, on the wrong side of the deserts of Cafe, and in a country dedicated to winter, are all the years that I did. And there, a certain valley shuts them in and hides them, as rumour has it from the world, but not from the sight of the moon, nor from those that dream of its rays.
And I said, "I will go from here by ways of dream, and I will come to that valley, and enter in and mourn there for the good years that I did." And I said, "I will take a wreath, a wreath of mourning, and lay it at their feet in token of my sorrow for their dues."
And when I sought about among the flowers, among the flowers for my wreath of mourning, the lily looked too large, and the laurel looked too solemn, and I found nothing frail enough, nor slender to serve as an offering to the years that were dead.
And at last, I made a slender wreath of daisies, in the manner that I had seen the maid in one of the years that is dead.
This, said I, is scarce, less fragile, or less frail than one of those delicate, forgotten years.
Then I took my wreath in my hand, and went from here. And when I had come by paths of mystery to that momentical hand, where the valley, that rumour told of, lies close to the mountainous moon, I searched among the craft for those poor, slight years, for whom I had brought my sorrow and my wreath.
And when I found there nothing in the grass, I said, time has shattered them and swept them away, and left not even any faint remains.
But looking upwards in the blaze of the moon, I suddenly saw a colour-sized sitting near, and tearing up and blotting out the stars and filling the night with blackness.
And at those idols' feet I saw praying and making obsiants kings and the dais that are all the times, and all the cities and all nations and all their gods. Neither the smoke of incense nor the sacrifice burning reached those colossal heads.
They sat there not to be measured, not to be overthrown, not to be worn away.
And I said, who are those? One answered, alone, the immortals.
And I said sadly, I came not to see dead gods, but I came to shed my tears and to offer flowers at the feet of certain little years that are dead and may not come again.
And he answered me, these are the years that are dead, alone, the immortals, all the years to be of their children. They fashioned their smiles and their laughter, all earthly kings.
They have crowned all gods, they have created all the events to be flown down from their feet like a river.
The worlds are flying pebbles that they have already thrown, and time and all his centuries behind him kneel there with blended crests in token of vassalage at their potent feet. And when I heard this, I turned away with my breath and went back to my own land, comforted.