Selections from Poe. Edgar Allan Poe

the mad pride of intellectuality,

      Maintained "the power of words" – denied that ever

      A thought arose within the human brain

      Beyond the utterance of the human tongue:

      And now, as if in mockery of that boast,

      Two words, two foreign soft dissyllables,

      Italian tones, made only to be murmured

      By angels dreaming in the moonlit "dew

      That hangs like chains of pearl on Hermon hill,"

      Have stirred from out the abysses of his heart

      Unthought-like thoughts, that are the souls of thought, —

      Richer, far wilder, far diviner visions

      Than even the seraph harper, Israfel

      (Who has "the sweetest voice of all God's creatures"),

      Could hope to utter. And I – my spells are broken;

      The pen falls powerless from my shivering hand;

      With thy dear name as text, though hidden by thee,

      I cannot write – I cannot speak or think —

      Alas, I cannot feel; for't is not feeling, —

      This standing motionless upon the golden

      Threshold of the wide-open gate of dreams,

      Gazing entranced adown the gorgeous vista,

      And thrilling as I see, upon the right,

      Upon the left, and all the way along,

      Amid empurpled vapors, far away

      To where the prospect terminates – thee only.

      AN ENIGMA

      "Seldom we find," says Solomon Don Dunce,

        "Half an idea in the profoundest sonnet.

      Through all the flimsy things we see at once

        As easily as through a Naples bonnet —

        Trash of all trash! how can a lady don it?

      Yet heavier far than your Petrarchan stuff,

      Owl-downy nonsense that the faintest puff

        Twirls into trunk-paper the while you con it."

      And, veritably, Sol is right enough.

      The general tuckermanities are arrant

      Bubbles, ephemeral and so transparent;

        But this is, now, you may depend upon it,

      Stable, opaque, immortal – all by dint

      Of the dear names that lie concealed within 't.

      TO HELEN

      I saw thee once – once only – years ago:

      I must not say how many – but not many.

      It was a July midnight; and from out

      A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring

      Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven,

      There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,

      With quietude and sultriness and slumber,

      Upon the upturned faces of a thousand

      Roses that grew in an enchanted garden,

      Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe:

      Fell on the upturned faces of these roses

      That gave out, in return for the love-light,

      Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death:

      Fell on the upturned faces of these roses

      That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted

      By thee, and by the poetry of thy presence.

      Clad all in white, upon a violet bank

      I saw thee half reclining; while the moon

      Fell on the upturned faces of the roses,

      And on thine own, upturned – alas, in sorrow!

      Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight —

      Was it not Fate (whose name is also Sorrow)

      That bade me pause before that garden-gate

      To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses?

      No footsteps stirred: the hated world all slept,

      Save only thee and me – O Heaven! O God!

      How my heart beats in coupling those two words! —

      Save only thee and me. I paused, I looked,

      And in an instant all things disappeared.

      (Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!)

      The pearly lustre of the moon went out:

      The mossy banks and the meandering paths,

      The happy flowers and the repining trees,

      Were seen no more: the very roses' odors

      Died in the arms of the adoring airs.

      All, all expired save thee – save less than thou:

      Save only the divine light in thine eyes,

      Save but the soul in thine uplifted eyes:

      I saw but them – they were the world to me:

      I saw but them, saw only them for hours,

      Saw only them until the moon went down.

      What wild heart-histories seem to lie enwritten

      Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres;

      How dark a woe, yet how sublime a hope;

      How silently serene a sea of pride;

      How daring an ambition; yet how deep,

      How fathomless a capacity for love!

      But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight,

      Into a western couch of thunder-cloud;

      And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing trees

      Didst glide away. Only thine eyes remained:

      They would not go – they never yet have gone;

      Lighting my lonely pathway home that night,

      They have not left me (as my hopes have) since;

      They follow me – they lead me through the years;

      They are my ministers – yet I their slave;

      Their office is to illumine and enkindle —

      My duty, to be saved by their bright light,

      And purified in their electric fire,

      And sanctified in their elysian fire,

      They fill my soul with beauty (which is hope),

      And are, far up in heaven, the stars I kneel to

      In the sad, silent watches of my night;

      While even in the meridian glare of day

      I see them still – two sweetly scintillant

      Venuses, unextinguished by the sun.

      A VALENTINE

      For her this rhyme is penned, whose luminous eyes,

        Brightly expressive as the twins of Leda,

      Shall find her own sweet name, that nestling lies

        Upon the page, enwrapped from every reader.

      Search narrowly the lines! they hold a treasure

        Divine,