Page images
PDF
EPUB

Caught from some unhappy master, whom unmerciful

disaster

Followed fast and followed faster, till his songs one bur

den bore,

Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore, Nevermore!"

Of Never

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling, Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door.

Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of

yore,

What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore,

Meant in croaking "Nevermore!"

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing To the fowl, whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's

core;

This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease re

clining

On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated

o'er:

But whose velvet violet lining, with the lamplight gloating o'er,

She shall press,

- ah! nevermore!

Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed from an

unseen censer

Swung by seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted

floor.

"Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee, by these angels he hath sent thee

Respite, respite and nepenthe from thy memories of

Lenore!

Quaff, O quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget the lost Lenore!

[ocr errors]

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore!"

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!-prophet still, if bird or devil!

Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,

Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land en

chanted,

On this home by Horror haunted,

Is there,

plore,

tell me truly, I im

is there balm in Gilead? - tell me, tell me, I implore!"

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore!"

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!

By that heaven that bends above us, by that God we both adore,

Tell this soul, with sorrow laden, if, within the distant

Aidenn,

It shall clasp a sainted maiden, whom the angels name

Lenore,

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels name Lenore!"

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore!"

"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting, -

"Get thee back into the tempest and the night's Plutonian shore!

Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath

spoken!

Leave my loneliness unbroken!

my door!

quit the bust above

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!"

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore!"

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting, On the pallid bust of Pallas, just above my chamber-door; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,

And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted - nevermore!

[graphic][merged small][merged small]

S

PEAK! speak! thou fearful guest!
Who, with thy hollow breast
Still in rude armor drest,

Comest to daunt me !

Wrapt not in Eastern balms,
But with thy fleshless palms
Stretched, as if asking alms,

Why dost thou haunt me?

Then, from those cavernous eyes
Pale flashes seemed to rise,
As when the Northern skies
Gleam in December;
And, like the water's flow
Under December's snow,

Came a dull voice of woe

From the heart's chamber.

"I was a Viking old!
My deeds, though manifold,
No Skald in song has told,
No Saga taught thee!

Take heed, that in thy verse Thou dost the tale rehearse, Else dread a dead man's curse; For this I sought thee.

Far in the Northern Land, By the wild Baltic's strand, I, with my childish hand, Tamed the gerfalcon ;

And, with my skates fast bound, Skimmed the half-frozen Sound, That the poor whimpering hound Trembled to walk on.

"Oft to his frozen lair
Tracked I the grisly bear,

While from my path the hare
Fled like a shadow;
Oft through the forest dark
Followed the were-wolf's bark,
Until the soaring lark

Sang from the meadow.

"But when I older grew,
Joining a corsair's crew,
O'er the dark sea I flew
With the marauders.
Wild was the life we led;
Many the souls that sped,
Many the hearts that bled,
By our stern orders.

« PreviousContinue »