Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849). For Annie. Arthur Quiller-Couch, comp. 1922. The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse

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Arthur Quiller-Couch, comp. The Oxford Book of Victorian Verse. 1922.

For Annie

By Edgar Allan Poe (1809–1849)


THANK Heaven! the crisis—
The danger is past,
And the lingering illness
Is over at last—
And the fever called ‘Living’	5
Is conquer’d at last.

Sadly, I know
I am shorn of my strength,
And no muscle I move
As I lie at full length:	10
But no matter—I feel
I am better at length.

And I rest so composedly
Now, in my bed,
That any beholder	15
Might fancy me dead—
Might start at beholding me,
Thinking me dead.

The moaning and groaning,
The sighing and sobbing,	20
Are quieted now,
With that horrible throbbing
At heart—ah, that horrible,
Horrible throbbing!

The sickness—the nausea—	25
The pitiless pain—
Have ceased, with the fever
That madden’d my brain—
With the fever called ‘Living’
That burn’d in my brain.	30

And O! of all tortures
That torture the worst
Has abated—the terrible
Torture of thirst
For the naphthaline river	35
Of Passion accurst:
I have drunk of a water
That quenches all thirst.

—Of a water that flows,
With a lullaby sound,	40
From a spring but a very few
Feet under ground—
From a cavern not very far
Down under ground.

And ah! let it never	45
Be foolishly said
That my room it is gloomy,
And narrow my bed;
For man never slept
In a different bed—	50
And, to sleep, you must slumber
In just such a bed.

My tantalized spirit
Here blandly reposes,
Forgetting, or never	55
Regretting its roses—
Its old agitations
Of myrtles and roses:

For now, while so quietly
Lying, it fancies	60
A holier odour
About it, of pansies—
A rosemary odour,
Commingled with pansies—
With rue and the beautiful	65
Puritan pansies.

And so it lies happily,
Bathing in many
A dream of the truth
And the beauty of Annie—	70
Drown’d in a bath
Of the tresses of Annie.

She tenderly kiss’d me,
She fondly caress’d,
And then I fell gently	75
To sleep on her breast—
Deeply to sleep
From the heaven of her breast

When the light was extinguish’d,
She cover’d me warm,	80
And she pray’d to the angels
To keep me from harm—
To the queen of the angels
To shield me from harm.

And I lie so composedly,	85
Now, in my bed
(Knowing her love),
That you fancy me dead—
And I rest so contentedly,
Now, in my bed	90
(With her love at my breast),
That you fancy me dead—
That you shudder to look at me,
Thinking me dead.

But my heart it is brighter	95
Than all of the many
Stars in the sky,
For it sparkles with Annie—
It glows with the light
Of the love of my Annie—	100
With the thought of the light
Of the eyes of my Annie.

CONTENTS · BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

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