Helen, thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicéan barks of yore,
That gently, o’er a perfumed sea,
The weary, way-worn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.
On desperate seas long wont to roam,
Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the glory that was Greece,
And the grandeur that was Rome.
Lo! in yon brilliant window-niche
How statue-like I see thee stand,
The agate lamp within thy hand!
Ah, Psyche, from the regions which
Are Holy-Land!
– Edgar Allan Poe
In visions of the dark nightI have dreamed of joy departed—But a waking dream of life and lightHath left me broken-hearted. Ah! what is not a dream by dayTo him whose eyes are castOn things around him with a rayTurned back upon the past? That holy dream—that holy dream,While all the world were chiding,Hath cheered…
Thank Heaven! the crisis,The danger, is past,And the lingering illnessIs over at last—And the fever called “Living”Is conquered at last. Sadly, I knowI am shorn of my strength,And no muscle I moveAs I lie at full length—But no matter!—I feelI am better at length. And I rest so composedly,Now, in my bed,That any beholderMight fancy…
If you can keep your head when all about youAre losing theirs and blaming it on you,If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,But make allowance for their doubting too;If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,And…
It was many and many a year ago,In a kingdom by the sea,That a maiden there lived whom you may knowBy the name of Annabel Lee;And this maiden she lived with no other thoughtThan to love and be loved by me. I was a child and she was a child,In this kingdom by the sea,But…
Lo! Death has reared himself a throneIn a strange city lying aloneFar down within the dim West,Where the good and the bad and the worst and the bestHave gone to their eternal rest.There shrines and palaces and towers(Time-eaten towers that tremble not!)Resemble nothing that is ours.Around, by lifting winds forgot,Resignedly beneath the skyThe melancholy waters…
If it is not my portion to meet thee in this lifethen let me ever feel that I have missed thy sight——let me not forget for a moment,let me carry the pangs of this sorrow in my dreamsand in my wakeful hours. As my days pass in the crowded market of this worldand my hands…