Dim vales- and shadowy floods-
     And cloudy-looking woods,
     Whose forms we can't discover
     For the tears that drip all over:
     Huge moons there wax and wane-
     Again- again- again-
     Every moment of the night-
     Forever changing places-
     And they put out the star-light
     With the breath from their pale faces.
     About twelve by the moon-dial,
     One more filmy than the rest
     (A kind which, upon trial,
     They have found to be the best)
     Comes down- still down- and down,
     With its centre on the crown
     Of a mountain's eminence,
     While its wide circumference
     In easy drapery falls
     Over hamlets, over halls,
     Wherever they may be-
     O'er the strange woods- o'er the sea-
     Over spirits on the wing-
     Over every drowsy thing-
     And buries them up quite
     In a labyrinth of light-
     And then, how deep!- O, deep,
     Is the passion of their sleep.
     In the morning they arise,
     And their moony covering
     Is soaring in the skies,
     With the tempests as they toss,
     Like- almost any thing-
     Or a yellow Albatross.
     They use that moon no more
     For the same end as before,
     Videlicet, a tent-
     Which I think extravagant:
     Its atomies, however,
     Into a shower dissever,
     Of which those butterflies
     Of Earth, who seek the skies,
     And so come down again
     (Never-contented things!)
     Have brought a specimen
     Upon their quivering wings.

~ Edgar Allan Poe

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