KUBLA KHAN

IN Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure-dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.

So twice five miles of fertile ground

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With walls and towers were girdled round:

And here were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

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But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!

A savage place! as holy and enchanted

As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

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And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,

As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:
And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,

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And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:

And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!

The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;

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Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.

It was a miracle of rare device,

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A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

To such a deep delight 'twould win me,

Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

THE PAINS OF SLEEP

ERE on my bed my limbs I lay,
It hath not been my use to pray

With moving lips or bended knees;
But silently, by slow degrees,

My spirit I to Love compose,

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In humble trust mine eyelids close,

With reverential resignation,

No wish conceived, no thought exprest,
Only a sense of supplication;

Desire with loathing strangely mixed
On wild or hateful objects fixed.
Fantastic passions! maddening brawl!
And shame and terror over all!
Deeds to be hid which were not hid,

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Which all confused I could not know,
Whether I suffered, or I did:

For all seemed guilt, remorse, or woe,
My own or others', still the same
Life-stifling fear, soul-stifling shame.

So two nights passed; the night's dismay
Saddened and stunned the coming day.
Sleep, the wide blessing, seemed to me

Distemper's worst calamity.

The third night, when my own loud scream
Had waked me from the fiendish dream,
O'ercome with sufferings strange and wild,
I wept, as I had been a child;

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And having thus by tears subdued

My anguish to a milder mood,

Such punishments, I said, were due

To natures deepliest stained with sin, -
For aye entempesting anew

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The unfathomable hell within

The horror of their deeds to view,

To know and loathe, yet wish and do!

Such griefs with such men well agree,

But wherefore, wherefore fall on me?
To be beloved is all I need,

And whom I love, I love indeed.

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DEJECTION: AN ODE

Written April 4, 1802

Late, late yestreen I saw the new Moon,

With the old Moon in her arms;

And I fear, I fear, my Master dear!
We shall have a deadly storm.

BALLAD OF SIR PATRICK SPENCE.

WELL! If the Bard was weather-wise who made
The grand old ballad of Sir Patrick Spence,
This night, so tranquil now, will not go hence
Unroused by winds, that ply a busier trade
Than those which mould yon cloud in lazy flakes, 5
Or the dull sobbing draft, that moans and rakes
Upon the strings of this Eolian lute,

Which better far were mute.

For lo! the New-moon winter-bright!
And overspread with phantom light,
(With swimming phantom light o'erspread
But rimmed and circled by a silver thread)

I see the old Moon in her lap, foretelling

The coming on of rain and squally blast. And oh! that even now the gust were swelling,

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And the slant night-shower driving loud and fast! 15 Those sounds which oft have raised me, whilst they awed,

And sent my soul abroad,

Might now perhaps their wonted impulse give,

Might startle this dull pain, and make it move and

live!

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