EDGAR ALLAN POE SONNET-TO SCIENCE Science, true daughter of Old Time thou art! Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing? And driven the Hamadryad from the wood To seek a shelter in some happier star? Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood, The Elfin from the green grass, and from me The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree? (Oh, how, without you, Love, Could angels be blest ?)— Those kisses of true love That lull'd ye to rest! Up! shake from your wing Each hindering thing: The dew of the night It would weigh down your flight; And true-love caresses O, leave them apart; They are light on the tresses, But lead on the heart. Ligeia! Ligeia! My beautiful one! Whose harshest idea Will to melody run, O, is it thy will On the breezes to toss? Or, capriciously still, Like the lone Albatross, Incumbent on night (As she on the air) To keep watch with delight Ligeia, wherever 25 30 35 40 On the harmony there? 45 THE CITY IN THE SEA Lo, Death has reared himself a throne In a strange city lying alone Far down within the dim West, Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best Have gone to their eternal rest. 5 There shrines and palaces and towers (Time-eaten towers that tremble not!) Resemble nothing that is ours. Around, by lifting winds forgot, Resignedly beneath the sky The melancholy waters lie. No rays from the holy heaven come down On the long night-time of that town; 1Ο |