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And I with sobs did pray —

       ”O let me be awake, my God!

       Or let me sleep alway!”

      The harbour-bay was clear as glass,

       So smoothly it was strewn!

       And on the bay the moonlight lay,

       And the shadow of the moon.

      The rock shone bright, the kirk no less:

       That stands above the rock:

       The moonlight steep’d in silentness

       The steady weathercock.

      And the bay was white with silent light,

       Till rising from the same

       Full many shapes, that shadows were,

       In crimson colours came.

      A little distance from the prow

       Those crimson shadows were:

       I turn’d my eyes upon the deck —

       O Christ! what saw I there?

      Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat;

       And by the Holy rood

       A man all light, a seraph-man,

       On every corse there stood.

      This seraph-band, each wav’d his hand:

       It was a heavenly sight:

       They stood as signals to the land,

       Each one a lovely light:

      This seraph-band, each wav’d his hand,

       No voice did they impart —

       No voice; but O! the silence sank,

       Like music on my heart.

      But soon I heard the dash of oars,

       I heard the pilot’s cheer:

       My head was turn’d perforce away

       And I saw a boat appear.

      The pilot, and the pilot’s boy

       I heard them coming fast:

       Dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy,

       The dead men could not blast.

      I saw a third — I heard his voice:

       It is the Hermit good!

       He singeth loud his godly hymns

       That he makes in the wood.

       He’ll shrive my soul, he’ll wash away

       The Albatross’s blood.

      VII.

      This Hermit good lives in that wood

       Which slopes down to the Sea.

       How loudly his sweet voice he rears!

       He loves to talk with Mariners

       That come from a far countrée.

      He kneels at morn and noon and eve —

       He hath a cushion plump:

       It is the moss, that wholly hides

       The rotted old Oak-stump.

      The Skiff-boat ner’d: I heard them talk,

       ”Why, this is strange, I trow!

       Where are those lights so many and fair

       That signal made but now?”

      ”Strange, by my faith!” the Hermit said —

       ”And they answer’d not our cheer.

       The planks look warp’d, and see those sails

       How thin they are and sere!

       I never saw aught like to them

       Unless perchance it were”

      ”The skeletons of leaves that lag

       My forest brook along:

       When the Ivy-tod is heavy with snow,

       And the Owlet whoops to the wolf below

       That eats the she-wolf’s young.”

      ”Dear Lord! it has a fiendish look—”

       (The Pilot made reply)

       ”I am a-fear’d.”—”Push on, push on!”

       ”Said the Hermit cheerily.”

      The Boat came closer to the Ship,

       But I nor spake nor stirr’d!

       The Boat came close beneath the Ship,

       And strait a sound was heard!

      Under the water it rumbled on,

       Still louder and more dread:

       It reach’d the Ship, it split the bay;

       The Ship went down like lead.

      Stunn’d by that loud and dreadful sound,

       Which sky and ocean smote:

       Like one that hath been seven days drown’d

       My body lay afloat:

       But, swift as dreams, myself I found

       Within the Pilot’s boat.

      Upon the whirl, where sank the Ship,

       The boat spun round and round:

       And all was still, save that the hill

       Was telling of the sound.

      I mov’d my lips: the Pilot shriek’d

       And fell down in a fit.

       The Holy Hermit rais’d his eyes

       And pray’d where he did sit.

      I took the oars: the Pilot’s boy,

       Who now doth crazy go,

       Laugh’d loud and long, and all the while

       His eyes went to and fro,

       ”Ha! ha!” quoth he—”full plain I see,

       The devil knows how to row.”

      And now all in mine own Countrée

       I stood on the firm land!

       The Hermit stepp’d forth from the boat,

       And scarcely he could stand.

      ”O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy Man!”

       The Hermit cross’d his brow —

       ”Say quick,” quoth he, “I bid thee say

       What manner man art thou?”

      Forthwith this frame of mind was wrench’d

       With a woeful agony,

       Which forc’d me to begin my tale

       And then it left me free.

      Since then at an uncertain hour,

       That agency returns;

       And till my ghastly tale is told

       This heart within me burns.

      I pass, like night, from land to land;

       I have strange power of speech;

       The moment that his face I see

       I know the man that must hear me;

       To him my tale I teach.

      What loud uproar bursts from that door!

       The Wedding-guests are there;

       But in the Garden-bower the Bride

       And Bride-maids singing are:

       And hark the little Vesper-bell

      

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