Samuel Coleridge - The Complete Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (Illustrated Edition)

In mist or cloud on mast or shroud

It perch’d for vespers nine,

Whiles all the night thro’ fog-smoke white

Glimmer’d the white moonshine.

”God save thee, ancient Mariner!

From the fiends that plague thee thus—”

”Why look’st thou so? — with my cross bow

I shot the Albatross.”

II:

The Sun now rose upon the right,

Out of the Sea came he;

Still hid in mist; and on the left

Went down into the Sea.

And the good south wind still blew behind,

But no sweet Bird did follow

Nor any day for food or play

Came to the Mariner’s hollo!

And I had done an hellish thing

And it would work e’m woe:

For all averr’d, I had kill’d the Bird

That made the Breeze to blow.

Nor dim nor red, like an Angel’s head,

The glorious Sun uprist:

Then all averr’d, I had kill’d the Bird

That brought the fog and mist.

’Twas right, said they, such birds to slay

That bring the fog and mist.

The breezes blew, the white foam flew,

The furrow follow’d free:

We were the first that ever burst

Into that silent Sea.

Down dropt the breeze, the Sails dropt down,

’Twas sad as sad could be

And we did speak only to break

The silence of the Sea.

All in a hot and copper sky

The bloody sun at noon,

Right up above the mast did stand,

No bigger than the moon.

Day after day, day after day,

We stuck, nor breath nor motion,

As idle as a painted Ship

Upon a painted Ocean.

Water, water, every where

And all the boards did shrink;

Water, water, every where,

Nor any drop to drink.

The very deeps did rot: O Christ!

That ever this should be!

Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs

Upon the slimy Sea.

About, about, in reel and rout

The Death-fires danc’d at night;

The water, like a witch’s oils.

Burnt green and blue and white.

And some in dreams assured were

Of the Spirit that plagued us so:

Nine fathom deep he had follow’d us

From the Land of Mist and Snow.

And every tongue thro’ utter drouth

Was wither’d at the root;

We could not speak no more than if

We had been choked with soot.

Ah wel-a-day! what evil looks

Had I from old and young;

Instead of the Cross the Albatross

About my neck was hung.

III.

So past a weary time; each throat

Was parch’d, and glaz’d each eye,

When, looking westward, I beheld

A something in the sky.

At first it seem’d a little speck

And then it seem’d a mist:

It mov’d and mov’d, and took at last

A certain shape, I wist.

A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist!

And still it near’d and near’d;

And, as if it dodg’d a water-sprite,

It plung’d and tack’d and veer’d.

With throat unslack’d, with black lips bak’d

We could nor laugh nor wail;

Thro’ utter drouth all dumb we stood

Till I bit my arm and suck’d the blood,

And cry’d, A sail! a sail!

With throat unslack’d, with black lips bak’d

Agape they heard me call:

Gramercy! they for joy did grin

And all at once their breath drew in

As they were drinking all.

See! See! (I cry’d) she tacks no more!

Hither to work us weal

Without a breeze, without a tide

She steddies with upright keel!

The western wave was all a flame,

The day was well nigh done!

Almost upon the western wave

Rested the broad bright Sun;

When that strange shape drove suddenly

Betwixt us and the Sun.

And strait the Sun was fleck’d with bars

(Heaven’s mother send us grace)

As if thro’ a dungeon grate he peer’d

With broad and burning face.

Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud)

How fast she nears and nears!

Are those her Sails that glance in the Sun

Like restless gossameres?

Are those her Ribs, thro’ which the Sun

Did peer, as thro’ a grate?

And are those two all, all her crew.

That Woman, and her Mate?

His bones were black with many a crack,

All black and bare, I ween;

Jet-black and bare, save where with rust

Of mouldy damps and charnel crust

They were patch’d with purple and green.

Her lips were red, her looks were free,

Her locks were yellow as gold:

Her skin was as white as leprosy,

And she was far liker Death than he;

Her flesh made the still air cold.

The naked Hulk alongside came

And the Twain were playing dice;

”The Game is done! I’ve won, I’ve won!”

Quoth she, and whistled thrice.

A gust of wind sterte up behind

And whistled thro’ his bones;

Thro’ the holes of his eyes and the hole of his mouth

Half-whistles and half-groans.

With never a whisper in the Sea

Off darts the Spectre-ship;

While clombe above the Eastern bar

The horned Moon, with one bright Star

Almost between the tips.

One after one by the horned Moon

(Listen, O Stranger! to me)

Each turn’d his face with a ghastly pang

And curs’d me with his ee.

Four times fifty living men,

With never a sigh or groan,

With heavy thump, a lifeless lump

They dropp’d down one by one.

Their souls did from their bodies fly, —

They fled to bliss or woe;

And every soul it pass’d me by,

Like, the whiz of my Cross-bow.

IV.

”I fear thee, ancient Mariner!

I fear thy skinny hand;

And thou art long and lank and brown

As is the ribb’d Sea-sand.”

”I fear thee and thy glittering eye

And thy skinny hand so brown—”

”Fear not, fear not, thou wedding guest!

This body dropt not down.”

Alone, alone, all all alone

Alone on the wide wide Sea;

And Christ would take no pity on

My soul in agony.

The many men so beautiful,

And they all dead did lie!

And a million million slimy things

Liv’d on — and so did I.

I look’d upon the rotting Sea,

And drew my eyes away;

I look’d upon the ghastly deck,

And there the dead men lay.

I look’d to Heaven, and try’d to pray;

But or ever a prayer had gusht,

A wicked whisper came and made

My heart as dry as dust.

I clos’d my lids and kept them close,

Till the balls like pulses beat;

For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky

Lay like a load on my weary eye,

And the dead were at my feet.

The cold sweat melted from their limbs,

Nor rot, nor reek did they;

The look with which they look’d on me,

Had never pass’d away.

An orphan’s curse would drag to Hell

A spirit from on high:

But O! more horrible than that

Is the curse in a dead man’s eye!

Seven days, seven nights I saw that curse,

And yet I could not die.

The moving Moon went up the sky

And no where did abide:

Softly she was going up

And a star or two beside —

Her beams bemock’d the sultry main

Like April hoar-frost spread;

But where the ship’s huge shadow lay,

The charmed water burnt alway

A still and awful red.

Beyond the shadow of the ship

I watch’d the water-snakes:

They mov’d in tracks of shining white;

And when they rear’d, the elfish light

Fell off in hoary flakes.

Within the shadow of the ship

I watch’d their rich attire:

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black

They coil’d and swam; and every track

Was a flash of golden fire.

O happy living things! no tongue

Their beauty might declare: