SERENADE

SERENADE

Edgar Allan Poe

So sweet the hour, so calm the time,

I feel it more than half a crime, 

When nature sleep and stars are mute,

To mar the silence ev'n with lute.

At rest on ocean's brilliant dyes

An image of Elysium lies:

Seven Pleiades entrance in Heaven,

Form in the deep another seven:

Endymion nodding from above

Sees in the see a second live.

Within the valleys dim and brown,

And on the spectral mountains crown,

The wearied lights is dying down

and Earth, and stars, and sea, and sky

Are redolent of sleep, as I

Am redolent of thee and thine

Enthralling love my Adeline.

But list, o list- so soft and low

That, scarce awake, thy soul shall deem

My words the music of a dream.

Thus, while no single sound too rude

Upon they slumber shall intrude

Our thoughts, our souls- O God above

In every deed shall mingle, love.

EVENING STAR

EVENING STAR

Edgar Allan Poe

'Twas noontime of summer,

And mid-time of right;

And stars, in their orbits,

Shone pale, thro' the light

Of the brighter, cold moon,

'mid planets her slaves, 

Herself in the Heavens

Here beams on the waves,

I gazes awhile

On her cold smile

Too cold- too cold for me-

There pass'd, as a shroud,

A fleecy cloud,

And turned away to thee

Proud evening star, 

In thy glory afar,

\And dearer thy beam shall be

For the joy of my heart

Is the proud part

Thou barest in Heaven at night

And more I admire

Thy distant fire,

Than that colder, lonely light.

A DREAM

A DREAM

Edgar Allan Poe

In vision of the dark night

I have dreamed of joy departed-

But a waking dream of my life and light

Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! What is not a dream by day

To him whose eyes are cast

On thing around him with a ray

Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream- that holy dream,

While all the world were chiding,

Hath cheered me as a lonely beam

A lonely spirit guiding

What though that light, thro' storm and night,

So trembled from afar-

What could there be more purely bright

In Truth's day-star?

ANNABEL LEE

ANNABEL LEE

Edgar Allan Poe

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.