- McCartney was inspired by the poem and acknowledges Dekker in the liner notes to Abbey Road. A Cradle Song. "Cradle Song" by Thomas Dekker was originally written as a poem around 1599.

The poem appears in Dekker's 1603 comedy Patient Grissel. "Golden Slumbers" is based on the poem "Cradle Song", a lullaby by the dramatist Thomas Dekker. The Beatles wrote a song based on the poem called, "Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight". Golden slumbers kiss your eyes, Smiles awake you when you rise. McCartney saw sheet music for "Cradle Song" at his father's home in Liverpool, left on a piano by his stepsister Ruth. In the 1885 collection "St Nicholas Songs", p. 177, is W J … by Thomas Dekker. Cradle Song is a beautiful lullaby written by Thomas Dekker and was first time published in 1603. Parts from this popular lullaby is used in the Beatles' song Golden Slumber. The Cradle Song.
McCartney uses the first stanza of the original poem, with minor word changes, adding to it a single lyric line repeated with minor variation. The song appears in Act 4, Scene II of the play The Pleasant Comodie of Patient Grissill by Thomas Dekker, Henry Chettle and William Haughton, first printed 1603 (although an earlier performance was mentioned in a Philip Henslowe diary entry from December 1599). Unable to read music, he created his own music. This is one of the most soothing short Renaissance poems – and perhaps the best-known Renaissance lullaby, or ‘cradle song’, out there.

This made the lullaby Cradle Song very popular again overnight.

Memorably used by The Beatles as the lyrics for their song of the same name on the Abbey Road LP, ‘Golden Slumbers’ is a lullaby from Thomas Dekker’s 1603 play Patient Grissel, written with Henry Chettle and William Haughton. Sleep, pretty wantons, do not cry, And I will sing a lullaby: Rock them, rock them, lullaby.