1. Dream-Land

By a route obscure and lonely, 

Haunted by ill angels only, 

Where an Eidolon, named Night, 

On a black throne reigns upright, 

I have reached these lands but newly 

From an ultimate dim Thule — 

From a wild weird clime that lieth, sublime, 

Out of Space — out of Time. 

  

Bottomless vales and boundless floods, 

And chasms, and caves, and Titan woods, 

With forms that no man can discover 

For the dews that drip all over; 

Mountains toppling evermore 

Into seas without a shore; 

Seas that restlessly aspire, 

Surging, unto skies of fire; 

Lakes that endlessly outspread 

Their lone waters — lone and dead, — 

Their still waters — still and chilly 

With the snows of the lolling lily. 

  

By the lakes that thus outspread 

Their lone waters, lone and dead, — 

Their sad waters, sad and chilly 

With the snows of the lolling lily, — 

By the mountains — near the river 

Murmuring lowly, murmuring ever, — 

By the grey woods, — by the swamp 

Where the toad and the newt encamp, — 

By the dismal tarns and pools 

Where dwell the Ghouls, — 

By each spot the most unholy — 

In each nook most melancholy, — 

There the traveller meets aghast 

Sheeted Memories of the Past — 

Shrouded forms that start and sigh 

As they pass the wanderer by — 

White-robed forms of friends long given, 

In agony, to the Earth — and Heaven. 

  

For the heart whose woes are legion 

’Tis a peaceful, soothing region — 

For the spirit that walks in shadow 

O! it is an Eldorado! 

But the traveller, travelling through it, 

May not — dare not openly view it; 

Never its mysteries are exposed 

To the weak human eye unclosed; 

So wills its King, who hath forbid 

The uplifting of the fringed lid; 

And thus the sad Soul that here passes 

Beholds it but through darkened glasses. 

  

By a route obscure and lonely, 

Haunted by ill angels only, 

Where an Eidolon, named NIGHT, 

On a black throne reigns upright, 

I have wandered home but newly 

From this ultimate dim Thule.