Selections from Poe Part 3

My love, she sleeps. Oh, may her sleep, 45 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 hath flung its black 50 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, 55 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! 60

LENORE

Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever Let the bell toll!--a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river; And, Guy De Vere, hast _thou_ no tear?--weep now or never more!

See, on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!

Come, let the burial rite be read--the funeral song be sung, 5 An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young, A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young.

"Wretches, ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride, And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her--that she died!

How _shall_ the ritual, then, be read? the requiem how be sung 10 By you--by yours, the evil eye,--by yours, the slanderous tongue That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?"

_Peccanimus_; but rave not thus! and let a Sabbath song Go up to G.o.d so solemnly the dead may feel no wrong.

The sweet Lenore hath gone before, with Hope that flew beside, 15 Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should have been thy bride: For her, the fair and debonair, that now so lowly lies, The life upon her yellow hair but not within her eyes; The life still there, upon her hair--the death upon her eyes.

"Avaunt! avaunt! from friends below, the indignant ghost is riven-- 20 From h.e.l.l unto a high estate far up within the Heaven-- From grief and groan, to a golden throne, beside the King of Heaven!

Let no bell toll, then,--lest her soul, amid its hallowed mirth, Should catch the note as it doth float up from the d.a.m.ned Earth!

And I!--to-night my heart is light!--No dirge will I upraise, 25 But waft the angel on her flight with a Paean of old days."

THE VALLEY OF UNREST

Once it smiled a silent dell Where the people did not dwell; They had gone unto the wars, Trusting to the mild-eyed stars, Nightly, from their azure towers, 5 To keep watch above the flowers, In the midst of which all day The red sunlight lazily lay.

Now each visitor shall confess The sad valley's restlessness. 10 Nothing there is motionless, Nothing save the airs that brood Over the magic solitude.

Ah, by no wind are stirred those trees That palpitate like the chill seas 15 Around the misty Hebrides!

Ah, by no wind those clouds are driven That rustle through the unquiet Heaven Uneasily, from morn till even, Over the violets there that lie 20 In myriad types of the human eye, Over the lilies there that wave And weep above a nameless grave!

They wave:--from out their fragrant tops Eternal dews come down in drops. 25 They weep:--from off their delicate stems Perennial, tears descend in gems.

THE COLISEUM

Type of the antique Rome! Rich reliquary Of lofty contemplation left to Time By buried centuries of pomp and power!

At length--at length--after so many days Of weary pilgrimage and burning thirst 5 (Thirst for the springs of lore that in thee lie), I kneel, an altered and an humble man, Amid thy shadows, and so drink within My very soul thy grandeur, gloom, and glory.

Vastness, and Age, and Memories of Eld! 10 Silence, and Desolation, and dim Night!

I feel ye now, I feel ye in your strength, O spells more sure than e'er Judaean king Taught in the gardens of Gethsemane!

O charms more potent than the rapt Chaldee 15 Ever drew down from out the quiet stars!

Here, where a hero fell, a column falls!

Here, where the mimic eagle glared in gold, A midnight vigil holds the swarthy bat; Here, where the dames of Rome their gilded hair 20 Waved to the wind, now wave the reed and thistle; Here, where on golden throne the monarch lolled, Glides, spectre-like, unto his marble home,

Lit by the wan light of the horned moon, The swift and silent lizard of the stones. 25

But stay! these walls, these ivy-clad arcades, These mouldering plinths, these sad and blackened shafts, These vague entablatures, this crumbling frieze, These shattered cornices, this wreck, this ruin, These stones--alas! these gray stones--are they all, 30 All of the famed and the colossal left By the corrosive Hours to Fate and me?

"Not all"--the Echoes answer me--"not all!

Prophetic sounds and loud arise forever From us, and from all Ruin, unto the wise, 35 As melody from Memnon to the Sun.

We rule the hearts of mightiest men--we rule With a despotic sway all giant minds.

We are not impotent, we pallid stones: Not all our power is gone, not all our fame, 40 Not all the magic of our high renown, Not all the wonder that encircles us, Not all the mysteries that in us lie, Not all the memories that hang upon And cling around about us as a garment, 45 Clothing us in a robe of more than glory."

HYMN

At morn--at noon--at twilight dim, Maria! thou hast heard my hymn.

In joy and woe, in good and ill, Mother of G.o.d, be with me still!

When the hours flew brightly by, 5 And not a cloud obscured the sky, My soul, lest it should truant be, Thy grace did guide to thine and thee.

Now, when storms of fate o'ercast Darkly my Present and my Past, 10 Let my Future radiant s.h.i.+ne With sweet hopes of thee and thine!

TO ONE IN PARADISE

Thou wast all that to me, love, For which my soul did pine: A green isle in the sea, love, A fountain and a shrine All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, 5 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, 10 "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! 15 No more--no more--no more-- (Such language holds the solemn sea To the sands upon the sh.o.r.e) Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree, Or the stricken eagle soar. 20

And all my days are trances, And all my nightly dreams Are where thy gray eye glances, And where thy footstep gleams-- In what ethereal dances, 25 By what eternal streams.

TO F----

Beloved! amid the earnest woes That crowd around my earthly path (Drear path, alas! where grows Not even one lonely rose), My soul at least a solace hath 5 In dreams of thee, and therein knows An Eden of bland repose.

And thus thy memory is to me Like some enchanted far-off isle In some tumultuous sea,-- 10 Some ocean throbbing far and free With storms, but where meanwhile Serenest skies continually Just o'er that one bright island smile.

TO F----S S. O----D

Thou wouldst be loved?--then let thy heart From its present pathway part not: Being everything which now thou art, Be nothing which thou art not.

So with the world thy gentle ways, 5 Thy grace, thy more than beauty, Shall be an endless theme of praise, And love--a simple duty.