Shivering in fever, weak, and parched to sand, My ears, those entrances of word-dressed thoughts, My pictured eyes, and my assuring touch, Fell from me, and my body turned me forth From its beloved abode: then I was dead; And in my grave beside my corpse I sat, In vain attempting to return: meantime There came the untimely spectres of two babes, And played in my abandoned body's ruins; They went away; and, one by one, by snakes My limbs were swallowed; and, at last, I sat With only one, blue-eyed, curled round my ribs, Eating the last remainder of my heart, And hissing to himself. O sleep, thou fiend! Thou blackness of the night! how sad and frightful Are these thy dreams! |