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<h2>THE LAKE —— TO——</h2>
<h2>by Edgar Allan Poe</h2>
<p>
In spring of youth it was my lot<br/>
To haunt of the wide earth a spot<br/>
The which I could not love the less—<br/>
So lovely was the loneliness<br/>
Of a wild lake, with black rock bound,<br/>
And the tall pines that tower’d around.<br/>
<br/>
But when the Night had thrown her pall<br/>
Upon that spot, as upon all,<br/>
And the mystic wind went by<br/>
Murmuring in melody—<br/>
Then—ah then I would awake<br/>
To the terror of the lone lake.<br/>
<br/>
Yet that terror was not fright,<br/>
But a tremulous delight—<br/>
A feeling not the jewelled mine<br/>
Could teach or bribe me to define—<br/>
Nor Love—although the Love were thine.<br/>
<br/>
Death was in that poisonous wave,<br/>
And in its gulf a fitting grave<br/>
For him who thence could solace bring<br/>
To his lone imagining—<br/>
Whose solitary soul could make<br/>
An Eden of that dim lake.<br/>
<br/>
1827.<br/></p>
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