That maddened my brainWith the fever called "Living" That burned in my brain.
And oh! of all tortures That torture the worst Has abated-the terrible Torture of thirst For the napthaline river Of Passion accurst:- I have drunk of a water That quenches all thirst:-
Of a water that flows
With a lullaby sound From a spring but a very few Feet under ground-
From a cavern not very far Down under ground.
And ah! let it never Be foolishly said
That my room it is gloomy
And narrow my bed;
For man never slept
In a different bed
And, to sleep, you must slumber In just such a bed.
My tantalized spirit
Here blandly reposes, Forgetting or never Regretting its roses— Its old agitations
Of myrtles and roses:
For now, while so quietly Lying, it fancies
A holier odour
About it of pansies
A rosemary odour Commingled with pansies- With rue and the beautiful Puritan pansies.
And so it lies happily, Bathing in many
A dream of the truth
And the beauty of AnnieDrowned in a bath
Of the tresses of Annie.
She tenderly kissed me, She fondly caressed, And then I fell gently
To sleep on her breast— Deeply to sleep
From the heaven of her breast.
When the light was extinguished She covered me warm, And she prayed to the angels To keep me from harm- To the queen of the angels To shield me from harm.
And I lie so composedly, Now, in my bed (Knowing her love)
That you fancy me dead— And I rest so contentedly, Now, in my bed
(With her love at my breast) That you fancy me deadThat you shudder to look at me, Thinking me dead.
But my heart it is brighter
Than all of the many
Stars in the sky,
For it sparkles with Annie
TO ONE IN PARADISE.
THOU wast all that to me, love, For which my soul did pineisle in the sea, love,
A fountain, and a shrine
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, And all the flowers were mine.
Ah dream too bright to last! Ah starry hope that didst arise But to be overcast!
A voice from out the future cries, "On! on! "--but o'er the past (Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies Mute, motionless, aghast !
For, alas! alas! with me
The light of life is o'er !
No more-no more-no more (Such language holds the solemn sea To the sands upon the shore) Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree, Or the stricken eagle soar!
And all my days are trances, And all my nightly dreams Are where thy dark eye glances, And where thy footstep gleams-
In what ethereal dances,
By what eternal streams!
AT midnight, in the month of June, I stand beneath the mystic moon. An opiate vapour, dewy, dim, Exhales from out her golden rim, And, softly dripping, drop by drop, Upon the quiet mountain-top, Steals drowsily and musically Into the universal valley.
The rosemary nods upon the grave; The lily lolls upon the wave; Wrapping the fog about his breast, The ruin moulders into rest; Looking like Lethe, see! the lake A conscious slumber seems to take, And would not, for the world, awake. All Beauty sleeps!—and lo! where lies, Her casement open to the skies, Irene, with her destinies !
Oh lady bright! can it be right- This window open to the night? The wanton airs, from the tree-top, Laughingly through the lattice drop- The bodiless airs, a wizard rout, Flit through thy chamber in and out; And wave the curtain canopy So fitfully-so fearfully-
Above the closed and fringed lid
'Neath which thy slumbering soul lies hid That o'er the floor and down the wall Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall! Oh lady dear, hast thou no fear Why and what art thou dreaming here? Sure thou art come o'er far-off seas, A wonder to these garden-trees! Strange is thy pallor! strange thy dress! Strange, above all, thy length of tress, And this all solemn silentness!
The lady sleeps! Oh may her sleep,
Which is enduring, so be deep! Heaven have her in its sacred keep! This chamber changed for one more holy, This bed for one more melancholy,
I pray to God that she may lie For ever with unopened eye,
While the dim sheeted ghosts go by!
My love, she sleeps! Oh may her sleep, As it is lasting, so be deep!
Soft may the worms about her creep! Far in the forest, dim and old, For her may some tall vault unfold- Some vault that oft has flung its black And winged pannels fluttering back, Triumphant, o'er the crested palls Of her grand family funerals- Some sepulchre, remote, alone, Against whose portal she hath thrown, In childhood, many an idle stone— Some tomb from out whose sounding door She ne'er shall force an echo more, Thrilling to think, poor child of sin! It was the dead who groaned within.
A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM. TAKE this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow- You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.
I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
« PreviousContinue » |