Elegies
Ah, where to seek him? Many a desert place
Of lovely wonders once had known him well,
And pilgrim fancy follows on his trace;
But, when she seems to find his missing face,
And weeping prays him all his tale to tell—
No word she hears save, "Nevermore! Farewell!"
Never the freezing forest,[1] which the grim
North-easter sets a-tremble with one sigh,
Through all its plumy pine-tops in the sky,
Then rends with crash and uproar limb from limb—
Shall shut again its cedarn gates on him,
Nor whisper age-long secrets any more
Around the daring, dreaming hermit's door.
Oft the gold moon shall climb her midnight stair,
Above drear summits of the hemlock-tree—
With pale auroras decked, like streaming hair,
And from her chilly throne shall seek him there—
But her young lonely Poet, where is he?
From his wild prison where the stealthy Death
Went whispering through the trees with poniard breath,
Down thy snow gallery, thou steel-bound river,
Long since that poet passed away for ever.
Of lovely wonders once had known him well,
And pilgrim fancy follows on his trace;
But, when she seems to find his missing face,
And weeping prays him all his tale to tell—
No word she hears save, "Nevermore! Farewell!"
Never the freezing forest,[1] which the grim
North-easter sets a-tremble with one sigh,
Through all its plumy pine-tops in the sky,
Then rends with crash and uproar limb from limb—
Shall shut again its cedarn gates on him,
Nor whisper age-long secrets any more
Around the daring, dreaming hermit's door.
Oft the gold moon shall climb her midnight stair,
Above drear summits of the hemlock-tree—
With pale auroras decked, like streaming hair,
And from her chilly throne shall seek him there—
But her young lonely Poet, where is he?
From his wild prison where the stealthy Death
Went whispering through the trees with poniard breath,
Down thy snow gallery, thou steel-bound river,
Long since that poet passed away for ever.
Ah, where to seek him? For no longer now
In richer wilds and skied with fiercer blue,
In richer wilds and skied with fiercer blue,
- ↑ See "Two Months on the Tobique."
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