Annabel Lee

Edgar Allan Poe

 
It was many and many a year ago,
   In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
   By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
   Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child and she was a child,
   In this kingdom by the sea:
But we loved with a love that was more than love--
   I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
   Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
   In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
   My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
   And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
   In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
   Went envying her and me--
Yes!--that was the reason (as all men know,
   In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
   Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
   Of those who were older than we--
   Of many far wiser than we--
And neither the angels in heaven above,
   Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
   Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling--my darling--my life and my bride,
   In her sepulchre there by the sea,
   In her tomb by the sounding sea.
 

Poems by This Author

A Dream Within a Dream by Edgar Allan Poe
Take this kiss upon the brow!
Alone by Edgar Allan Poe
From childhood's hour I have not been
An Acrostic by Edgar Allan Poe
Elizabeth it is in vain you say
Dream-Land by Edgar Allan Poe
By a route obscure and lonely
El Dorado by Edgar Allan Poe
Gaily bedight, / A gallant knight,
Lenore by Edgar Allan Poe
Ah broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!
Sonnet—Silence by Edgar Allan Poe
There are some qualities--some incorporate things
Spirits of the Dead by Edgar Allan Poe
Thy soul shall find itself alone
The Bells by Edgar Allan Poe
Hear the sledges with the bells--
The Haunted Palace by Edgar Allan Poe
In the greenest of our valleys
The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary
The Valley of Unrest by Edgar Allan Poe
Once it smiled a silent dell
To Helen by Edgar Allan Poe
Helen, thy beauty is to me
To My Mother by Edgar Allan Poe
Because I feel that, in the Heavens above
Ulalume by Edgar Allan Poe
The skies they were ashen and sober


Further Reading

Poems about Maidens
Fern Hill
by Dylan Thomas
Goblin Market
by Christina Rossetti
Maiden Lane
by Louise Morgan Sill
Meaningful Love
by John Ashbery
The Métier of Blossoming
by Denise Levertov
The Passing of the Year
by Robert W. Service
The Solitary Reaper
by William Wordsworth