124 lines
3.8 KiB
Plaintext
124 lines
3.8 KiB
Plaintext
1849
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FOR ANNIE
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by Edgar Allan Poe
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Thank Heaven! the crisis-
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The danger is past,
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And the lingering illness
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Is over at last-
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And the fever called "Living"
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Is conquered at last.
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Sadly, I know
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I am shorn of my strength,
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And no muscle I move
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As I lie at full length-
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But no matter!-I feel
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I am better at length.
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And I rest so composedly,
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Now, in my bed
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That any beholder
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Might fancy me dead-
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Might start at beholding me,
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Thinking me dead.
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The moaning and groaning,
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The sighing and sobbing,
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Are quieted now,
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With that horrible throbbing
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At heart:- ah, that horrible,
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Horrible throbbing!
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The sickness- the nausea-
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The pitiless pain-
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Have ceased, with the fever
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That maddened my brain-
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With the fever called "Living"
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That burned in my brain.
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And oh! of all tortures
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That torture the worst
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Has abated- the terrible
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Torture of thirst
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For the naphthaline river
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Of Passion accurst:-
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I have drunk of a water
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That quenches all thirst:-
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Of a water that flows,
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With a lullaby sound,
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From a spring but a very few
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Feet under ground-
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From a cavern not very far
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Down under ground.
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And ah! let it never
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Be foolishly said
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That my room it is gloomy
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And narrow my bed;
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For man never slept
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In a different bed-
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And, to sleep, you must slumber
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In just such a bed.
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My tantalized spirit
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Here blandly reposes,
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Forgetting, or never
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Regretting its roses-
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Its old agitations
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Of myrtles and roses:
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For now, while so quietly
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Lying, it fancies
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A holier odor
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About it, of pansies-
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A rosemary odor,
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Commingled with pansies-
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With rue and the beautiful
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Puritan pansies.
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And so it lies happily,
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Bathing in many
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A dream of the truth
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And the beauty of Annie-
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Drowned in a bath
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Of the tresses of Annie.
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She tenderly kissed me,
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She fondly caressed,
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And then I fell gently
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To sleep on her breast-
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Deeply to sleep
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From the heaven of her breast.
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When the light was extinguished,
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She covered me warm,
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And she prayed to the angels
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To keep me from harm-
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To the queen of the angels
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To shield me from harm.
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And I lie so composedly,
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Now, in my bed,
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(Knowing her love)
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That you fancy me dead-
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And I rest so contentedly,
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Now, in my bed,
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(With her love at my breast)
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That you fancy me dead-
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That you shudder to look at me,
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Thinking me dead.
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But my heart it is brighter
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Than all of the many
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Stars in the sky,
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For it sparkles with Annie-
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It glows with the light
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Of the love of my Annie-
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With the thought of the light
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Of the eyes of my Annie.
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-THE END-
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