t rise, a rotting green,
Up, up, and gather me with arms of steel,
Soft steel, and drag me where the wave is white,
Beneath that boulder there, that plants a keel
Against the ripple there, a shoulder lean.--
No! no! I must away before 'tis night!
Before the fire-flies dot
The dusk with sulphur blurrings bright!
Before upon yon height
The white wild-carrots vanish from the sight;
And boneset blossoms, tossing there in clusters,
Fade to a ridge, a streak of ghostly lustres.
And in yon sunlit spot,
That cedar tree is not!--
But a huge cap instead, that, half-asleep,
Some giant dropped while driving home his sheep.
And 'mid those fallow browns
And russet grays, the fragrant peak
Of yonder timothy stack,
Is not a stack, but something hideous, black,
That threatens and, grotesquely demon, frowns.

I must away from here.--
Already dusk draws near.
The owlet's dolorous hoot
Sounds quavering as a gnome's wild flute;
The toad, within the wet,
Begins to tune its goblin flageolet.
The slow sun sinks behind
Those hills; and like a withered cheek,
Distorted there, the spectral moon's defined
Above those trees; above that mass of vines
That, like a wrecked appentice, roofs those pines.--
Oh, I am faint and weak.--
I must away, away,
Before the close of day!--
Already at my back
I feel the woods grow black;
And sense the evening wind,
Guttural and gaunt and blind,
Snarling behind me like a were-wolf pack.--
When will it cease to pierce,
This anguish dull and fierce,
At heart and soul? when will it let me go?--

At last, with footsteps slow,
With half averted cheek,
I've reached this woodland creek,
Far from that place of fear;
And still I seem to hear
A dripping footstep near;
A gurgling voice dim glimmering at my ear.
I try to fly!--I can not!--yes, and no!--
What horror holds me!--God! that obscene, slow,
Sure mastering chimera there
Has yet some horrible feeler round my neck,
Or in my scattered hair!--
Off! off! thou devil's coil!--
The waters, thrashing, boil--
Once more I'm free! once more I'm free!
Glad of that firefly fleck,
That, like a lamp of golden fairy oil,
Lights me the way I flee.--
No more I stare, magnetic-fixed; nor reck,
Nor little care to foil
The madness there! the murder there! that slips
Back to its lair of slime, that seeps and drips,
That sought in vain