VI.

“But tell me, tell me! speak again,

Thy soft response renewing —

What makes that ship drive on so fast?

What is the Ocean doing?”

“Still as a Slave before his Lord,

The Ocean hath no blast:

His great bright eye most silently

Up to the moon is cast —”

“If he may know which way to go,

For she guides him smooth or grim,

See, brother, see! how graciously

She looketh down on him.”

“But why drives on that ship so fast

Without or wave or wind?”

“The air is cut away before,

And closes from behind.”

“Fly, brother, fly! more high, more high,

Or we shall be belated:

For slow and slow that ship will go,

When the Mariner's trance is abated.”

I woke, and we were sailing on

As in a gentle weather:

‘ Twas night, calm night, the moon was high;

The dead men stood together.

All stood together on the deck,

For a charnel-dungeon fitter:

All fix'd on me their stony eyes

That in the moon did glitter.

The pang, the curse, with which they died,

Had never pass'd away;

I could not draw my eyes from theirs

Nor turn them up to pray.

And now this spell was snapt: once more

I view'd the ocean green,

And look'd far forth, yet little saw

Of what had else been seen.

Like one, that on a lonesome road

Doth walk in fear and dread,

And having once turn'd round, walks on

And turns no more his head:

Because he knows, a frightful fiend

Doth close behind him tread.

But soon there breath'd a wind on me,

Nor sound nor motion made:

Its path was not upon the sea

In ripple or in shade.

It rais'd my hair, it fann'd my cheek,

Like a meadow-gale of spring —

It mingled strangely with my fears,

Yet it felt like a welcoming.

Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship

Yet she sail'd softly too:

Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze —

On me alone it blew.

O dream of joy! is this indeed

The light-house top I see?

Is this the Hill? Is this the Kirk?

Is this mine own countrée?

We drifted o'er the Harbour-bar,

And I with sobs did pray —

“O let me be awake, my God!

Or let me sleep alway!”

The harbour-bay was clear as glass,

So smoothly it was strewn!

And on the bay the moonlight lay,

And the shadow of the moon.

The rock shone bright, the kirk no less:

That stands above the rock:

The moonlight steep'd in silentness

The steady weathercock.

And the bay was white with silent light,

Till rising from the same

Full many shapes, that shadows were,

In crimson colours came.

A little distance from the prow

Those crimson shadows were:

I turn'd my eyes upon the deck —

O Christ! what saw I there?

Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat;

And by the Holy rood

A man all light, a seraph-man,

On every corse there stood.

This seraph-band, each wav'd his hand:

It was a heavenly sight:

They stood as signals to the land,

Each one a lovely light:

This seraph-band, each wav'd his hand,

No voice did they impart —

No voice; but O! the silence sank,

Like music on my heart.

But soon I heard the dash of oars,

I heard the pilot's cheer:

My head was turn'd perforce away

And I saw a boat appear.

The pilot, and the pilot's boy

I heard them coming fast:

Dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy,

The dead men could not blast.

I saw a third — I heard his voice:

It is the Hermit good!

He singeth loud his godly hymns

That he makes in the wood.

He'll shrive my soul, he'll wash away

The Albatross's blood.