KUBLA KHAN: OR, A VISION IN A DREAM. A FRAGMENT. In the summer of the year 1797, the Author, ther in ill health, had retired to a lonely farm-house between Porlock and Liuton, on the Exmoor confines of Somerset and Devonshire. In consequence of a slight indisposition, an anodyne had been prescribed, from the effect of which he fell asleep in his chair at the moment that he was reading the following sentence, or words of the same substance, in "Purchas's Pilgrimage:" "Here the Khan Kubla commanded a palace to be built, and a stately garden thereunto: and thus ten miles of fertile ground were inclosed with a wall." The author continued for about three hours in a profound sleep, at least of the external senses, during which time he has the most vivid confidence, that he could not have composed less than from two to three hundred lines; if that indeed can be called composition in which all the images rose up before him as things, with a parallel production of the correspondent expressions, without any sensation or consciousness of effort. On awaking he appeared to himself to have a distinct recollection of the whole, and taking his pen, ink, and paper, instantly and eagerly wrote down the lines that are here preserved. At this moment he was unfortunately called out by a person on business from Porlock, and detained by him above an hour, and on his return to his room, found, to his no small surprise and mortification, that though he still retained some vague and dim recollection of the general purport of the vision, yet, with the exception of some eight or ten scattered lines and images, all the rest had passed away like the images on the surface of a stream into which a stone had been cast, but, alas! without the after restoration of the latter: Then all the charm Is broken-all that phantom-world so fair And each mis-shape the other. Stay awhile, Poor youth! who scarcely dar'st lift up thine eyes— The stream will soon renew its smoothness, soon The visions will return! And lo! he stays, And soon the fragments dim of lovely forms Come trembling back, unite, and now once more Yet from the still surviving recollections in his mind, the Author has frequently purposed to finish for himself what had been originally, as it were, given to him. Avpiov üdiov ŭow: but the to-morrow is yet to come. As a contrast to this vision, I have anuexed a fragment of a very different character, describing with equal fidelity the dream of pain and disease -1816. KUBLA KHAN. IN Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree : Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man So twice five miles of fertile ground With walls and towers were girdled round: And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted By woman wailing for her demon-lover! And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething, The shadow of the dome of pleasure Where was heard the mingled measure It was a miracle of rare device, A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice! A damsel with a dulcimer In a vision once I saw : It was an Abyssinian maid, And on her dulcimer she played, Singing of Mount Abora. Could I revive within me To such a deep delight 'twould win me That with music loud and long, I would build that dome in air, That sunny dome! those caves of ice! THE PAINS OF SLEEP. ERE on my bed my limbs I lay, No wish conceived, no thought exprest, But yester-night I prayed aloud Of shapes and thoughts that tortured me: Sense of intolerable wrong, And whom I scorned, those only strong! Thirst of revenge, the powerless will Still baffled, and yet burning still! Desire with loathing strangely mixed So two nights passed: the night's dismay The third night, when my own loud scream And having thus by tears subdued The unfathomable hell within The horror of their deeds to view, To know and loathe, yet wish and do! And whom I love, I love indeed. LIMBO. 'Tis a strange place, this Limbo-not a Place, Lank Space, and scytheless Time with branny hands Not mark'd by flit of Shades,-unmeaning they But that is lovely-looks like human Time,- With scant white hairs, with foretop bald and high, As 'twere an organ full of silent sight, His whole face seemeth to rejoice in light!— He seems to gaze at that which seems to gaze on hin Hell knows a fear far worse, A fear-a future state;-'tis positive Negation! NE PLUS ULTRA. SOLE Positive of Night! Fate's only essence! primal scorpion rod— Arms the Grasp enorm― The Intercepter The Substance that still casts the shadow Death!The Dragon foul and fell— The unrevealable, And hidden one, whose breath Gives wind and fuel to the fires of Hell! Ah! sole despair Of both th' eternities in Heaven! |