To -- --
--. Ulalume: A Ballad
The skies they were ashen and sober;
The leaves they
were crispéd and sere—
The leaves they
were withering and sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial
year;
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
In the misty mid
region of Weir—
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,
In the ghoul-haunted
woodland of Weir.
Here once, through an alley Titanic,
Of cypress, I roamed
with my Soul—
Of cypress, with
Psyche, my Soul.
These were days when my heart was volcanic
As the scoriac rivers
that roll—
As the lavas that
restlessly roll
Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek
In the ultimate
climes of the pole—
That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek
In the realms of
the boreal pole.
Our talk had been serious and sober,
But our thoughts
they were palsied and sere—
Our memories were
treacherous and sere—
For we knew not the month was October,
And we marked not
the night of the year—
(Ah, night of all
nights in the year!)
We noted not the dim lake of Auber—
(Though once we
had journeyed down here)—
We remembered not the dank tarn of Auber,
Nor the ghoul-haunted
woodland of Weir.
And now, as the night was senescent
And star-dials pointed
to morn—
As the star-dials
hinted of morn—
At the end of our path a liquescent
And nebulous lustre
was born,
Out of which a miraculous crescent
Arose with a duplicate
horn—
Astarte's bediamonded crescent
Distinct with its
duplicate horn.
And I said—"She is warmer than Dian:
She rolls through
an ether of sighs—
She revels in a
region of sighs:
She has seen that the tears are not dry on
These cheeks, where
the worm never dies,
And has come past the stars of the Lion
To point us the
path to the skies—
To the Lethean peace
of the skies—
Come up, in despite of the Lion,
To shine on us with
her bright eyes—
Come up through the lair of the Lion,
With love in her
luminous eyes."
But Psyche, uplifting her finger,
Said—"Sadly
this star I mistrust—
Her pallor I strangely
mistrust:—
Oh, hasten! oh, let us not linger!
Oh, fly!—let us
fly!—for we must."
In terror she spoke, letting sink her
Wings till they
trailed in the dust—
In agony sobbed, letting sink her
Plumes till they
trailed in the dust—
Till they sorrowfully
trailed in the dust.
I replied—"This is nothing but dreaming:
Let us on by this
tremulous light!
Let us bathe in
this crystalline light!
Its Sybilic splendor is beaming
With Hope and in
Beauty to-night:—
See!—it flickers
up the sky through the night!
Ah, we safely may trust to its gleaming,
And be sure it will
lead us aright—
We safely may trust to a gleaming
That cannot but
guide us aright,
Since it flickers
up to Heaven through the night."
Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her,
And tempted her
out of her gloom—
And conquered her
scruples and gloom:
And we passed to the end of the vista,
But were stopped
by the door of a tomb—
By the door of a
legended tomb;
And I said—"What is written, sweet sister,
On the door of this
legended tomb?"
She replied—"Ulalume—Ulalume—
'Tis the vault of
thy lost Ulalume!"
Then my heart it grew ashen and sober
As the leaves that
were crispèd and sere—
As the leaves that
were withering and sere,
And I cried—"It was surely October
On this very night
of last year
That I journeyed—I
journeyed down here—
That I brought a
dread burden down here—
On this night of
all nights in the year,
Oh, what demon has
tempted me here?
Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber—
This misty mid region
of Weir—
Well I know, now, this dank tarn of Auber—
In the ghoul-haunted
woodland of Weir."
Said we, then—the two, then—"Ah, can it
Have been that the
woodlandish ghouls—
The pitiful, the
merciful ghouls—
To bar up our way and to ban it
From the secret
that lies in these wolds—
From the thing that
lies hidden in these wolds—
Had drawn up the spectre of a planet
From the limbo of
lunary souls—
This sinfully scintillant planet
From the Hell of
the planetary souls?"
Edgar Allan Poe |
