Sleep story · rain, green
A garden in the rain, when you have just finished work — for a racing mind
Steady rain on leaves, and a chair under an awning that stays dry.
Lights off. Press begin and let the story read itself to you, at the pace of sleep.
Screen on or off — we suggest dimming it, or simply closing your eyes after the first paragraph.
The story, in full
There is a wooden bench that nobody has sat on for an hour. The path has gone darker where it is wet, and there are two small puddles near the step. Somewhere in the hedge, a bird is sitting it out.
A snail is making its way along the bottom of the wall, going nowhere in particular. The leaves in the border are dark and glossy and moving slightly. The rain has settled into the kind that will last all afternoon without getting heavier.
Feel your belly rise and fall without any help from you. Your jaw can drop slightly. Let your teeth part.
Your elbows can stop being hinges for now. Let the mattress take all of it.
The watering can by the tap is full and nobody needs it. The earth smells the way it does after a long dry spell.
Let your lower back sink down into the mattress. Your chest can be still now.
Let your feet get heavy first. Heavier than they need to be. Feel your wrists loosen.
Under the awning it is dry, and the sound is a steady, unhurried patter. The rain on the roof of the awning is a lower sound than the rain on the leaves.
Let your toes stop holding on to anything. Let your tongue sit heavy in your mouth.
Water runs off the gutter in a thin, continuous line. There is nothing to do about any of it, which is the good part.
Let your thumbs rest where they landed. Let the pillow take the whole weight of your head.
If you feel restless, that's a feeling, not a failure. If you're bored, stay with the boredom for a moment. It's usually thinner than it looks.
Feel the top of your head relax into the pillow. Let your shoulder blades spread out and drop.
Let your attention settle somewhere low, like your feet. Stay with the weight of your body.
You do not have to count them. Let the thoughts come and go without you getting up to answer. Let the sound of this go soft at the edges.
They will find their own way out. Let the quiet be boring. Just the weight.
The gap right after work is the easiest one to use.
Let this be the last thing you listen to.
18 paragraphs, roughly 3 minutes read slowly aloud. Written for rain, green.
If this story does not settle you, try A caravan by the sea, when you are at home and cannot settle — for jet lag, A field under snow (a sleep story), when you are not sure this will work — for the hours after a late shift or A field under snow (a sleep story), if you are sceptical about all of this — for an overtired night.