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(Listen, O Stranger! to me)

       Each turn’d his face with a ghastly pang

       And curs’d me with his ee.

      Four times fifty living men,

       With never a sigh or groan,

       With heavy thump, a lifeless lump

       They dropp’d down one by one.

      Their souls did from their bodies fly, —

       They fled to bliss or woe;

       And every soul it pass’d me by,

       Like, the whiz of my Cross-bow.

      IV.

      ”I fear thee, ancient Mariner!

       I fear thy skinny hand;

       And thou art long and lank and brown

       As is the ribb’d Sea-sand.”

      ”I fear thee and thy glittering eye

       And thy skinny hand so brown—”

       ”Fear not, fear not, thou wedding guest!

       This body dropt not down.”

      Alone, alone, all all alone

       Alone on the wide wide Sea;

       And Christ would take no pity on

       My soul in agony.

      The many men so beautiful,

       And they all dead did lie!

       And a million million slimy things

       Liv’d on — and so did I.

      I look’d upon the rotting Sea,

       And drew my eyes away;

       I look’d upon the ghastly deck,

       And there the dead men lay.

      I look’d to Heaven, and try’d to pray;

       But or ever a prayer had gusht,

       A wicked whisper came and made

       My heart as dry as dust.

      I clos’d my lids and kept them close,

       Till the balls like pulses beat;

       For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky

       Lay like a load on my weary eye,

       And the dead were at my feet.

      The cold sweat melted from their limbs,

       Nor rot, nor reek did they;

       The look with which they look’d on me,

       Had never pass’d away.

      An orphan’s curse would drag to Hell

       A spirit from on high:

       But O! more horrible than that

       Is the curse in a dead man’s eye!

       Seven days, seven nights I saw that curse,

       And yet I could not die.

      The moving Moon went up the sky

       And no where did abide:

       Softly she was going up

       And a star or two beside —

      Her beams bemock’d the sultry main

       Like April hoar-frost spread;

       But where the ship’s huge shadow lay,

       The charmed water burnt alway

       A still and awful red.

      Beyond the shadow of the ship

       I watch’d the water-snakes:

       They mov’d in tracks of shining white;

       And when they rear’d, the elfish light

       Fell off in hoary flakes.

      Within the shadow of the ship

       I watch’d their rich attire:

       Blue, glossy green, and velvet black

       They coil’d and swam; and every track

       Was a flash of golden fire.

      O happy living things! no tongue

       Their beauty might declare:

       A spring of love gusht from my heart,

       And I bless’d them unaware!

       Sure my kind saint took pity on me,

       And I bless’d them unaware.

      The selfsame moment I could pray;

       And from my neck so free

       The Albatross fell off, and sank

       Like lead into the sea.

      V.

      O sleep, it is a gentle thing

       Belov’d from pole to pole!

       To Mary-queen the praise be given

       She sent the gentle sleep from heaven

       That slid into my soul.

      The silly buckets on the deck

       That had so long remain’d,

       I dreamt that they were fill’d with dew

       And when I awoke it rain’d.

      My lips were wet, my throat was cold,

       My garments all were dank;

       Sure I had drunken in my dreams

       And still my body drank.

      I mov’d and could not feel my limbs,

       I was so light, almost

       I thought that I had died in sleep,

       And was a blessed Ghost.

      And soon I heard a roaring wind,

       It did not come anear;

       But with its sound it shook the sails

       That were so thin and sere.

      The upper air burst into life

       And a hundred fire-flags sheen

       To and fro they were hurried about;

       And to and fro, and in and out

       The wan stars danc’d between.

      And the coming wind did roar more loud;

       And the sails did sigh like sedge:

       And the rain pour’d down from one black cloud

       The moon was at its edge.

      The thick black cloud was cleft, and still

       The Moon was at its side:

       Like waters shot from some high crag,

       The lightning fell, with never a jag

       A river steep and wide.

      The loud wind never reach’d the Ship,

       Yet now the Ship mov’d on!

       Beneath the lightning and the moon

       The dead men gave a groan.

      They groan’d; they stirr’d, they all uprose,

       Nor spake, nor mov’d their eyes:

       It had been strange, even in a dream

       To have seen those dead men rise,

      The helmsman steerd, the ship mov’d on;

       Yet never a breeze up-blew;

       The Mariners all gan work the ropes,

       Where they were wont to do:

       They rais’d their limbs like lifeless tools —

       We were a ghastly crew.

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