
“There is nothing more difficult than waking someone who is only pretending to be asleep.”
Variant: While it is always possible to wake a person who's sleeping, no amount of noise will wake a person who is pretending to be asleep.
Source: Eating Animals
“There is nothing more difficult than waking someone who is only pretending to be asleep.”
“Will I lose my dignity? Will someone care? Will I wake tomorrow from this nightmare?”
Rent (1996)
“Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Fled is that music: — Do I wake or sleep?”
Stanza 8
Poems (1820), Ode to a Nightingale
The Waking (1953), The Waking
Source: The Collected Poems
Context: This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.
Title poem, section V.
The Venetian Bracelet (1829)