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 —

For ever 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.