the Raven

{one of my favorite poems}

Once upon a midnight dreary,
while I pondered
weak and weary
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping,
suddenly
there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -Only this, and
nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the
bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its
ghost
upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow -
sorrow for
the lost Lenore -For the
rare and radiant maiden
whom the angels named
Lenore - Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me -
filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;
-This it is, and nothing more,'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -On the morrow will he leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!Take thy beak from out my heart,

and take thy form from off my door!'

Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting,

still is sitting

On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,And the lamp-light o'er him streaming

throws his shadow on the floor;

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted - nevermore!

-edgar allen poe