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Lyric Poem · For Kids

The Land of Nod

by Robert Louis Stevenson · 1885

1From breakfast on through all the day

2At home among my friends I stay;

3But every night I go abroad

4Afar into the land of Nod.

5All by myself I have to go,

6With none to tell me what to do—

7All alone beside the streams

8And up the mountain-sides of dreams.

9The strangest things are there for me,

10Both things to eat and things to see,

11And many frightening sights abroad

12Till morning in the land of Nod.

13Try as I like to find the way,

14I never can get back by day,

15Nor can remember plain and clear

16The curious music that I hear.

Full-text availability follows the United States display decision recorded below; status can differ elsewhere.

Quick facts

Poem
The Land of Nod
Poet
Robert Louis Stevenson
Published
1885
Length
16 lines
Form
Lyric Poem, Rhyming Poems
Themes
For Kids, Dreams & Sleep

Craft notes

How this poem works

Measured from the text on this page, not copied from a summary. Counts are approximate: syllables and rhymes come from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which models General American English, so dialect, older pronunciation, and performance can all change what you hear.

Shape
16 lines · 4 quatrains
End rhyme
AABC in 75% of the stanzas. The remaining stanzas vary, often through slant rhyme.
Line length
Mostly 8-syllable lines (tetrameter length).
The poem’s silhouette — approximate syllables per line, measured from the text above. Even bars mean a measured line; ragged bars mean the poem sets its own widths.

Want the rules this form is measured against? Read what makes a lyric poem, or run your own draft through the form checker to see the same measurements on your lines. How we measure · Report a mistake

Text, source & rights

A traceable edition

Full-text display is based on the cited edition and a United States term-expiry review.

Author record
Robert Louis Stevenson1850–1894
Source record
WikisourceThe Land of Nod by robert-louis-stevenson, Wikisource transcription
Display decision
Full text · United States · reviewed 2026-07-18
Publication record
1885
Text fingerprint
SHA-256 31814f11b1c4bab9
Editorial handling
Whitespace and stanza breaks normalized for web display; no material wording change recorded.
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