By a route obscure and lonely,
 Haunted by ill angels only,
 Where an Eidolon, named NIGHT,
 On a black throne reigns upright,
 I have reached these lands but newly
 From an ultimate dim Thule-
 From a wild clime that lieth, sublime,
 Out of SPACE- out of TIME.

 Bottomless vales and boundless floods,
 And chasms, and caves, and Titan woods,
 With forms that no man can discover
 For the tears that drip all over;
 Mountains toppling evermore
 Into seas without a shore;
 Seas that restlessly aspire,
 Surging, unto skies of fire;
 Lakes that endlessly outspread
 Their lone waters- lone and dead,-
 Their still waters- still and chilly
 With the snows of the lolling lily.

 By the lakes that thus outspread
 Their lone waters, lone and dead,-
 Their sad waters, sad and chilly
 With the snows of the lolling lily,-
 By the mountains- near the river
 Murmuring lowly, murmuring ever,-
 By the grey woods,- by the swamp
 Where the toad and the newt encamp-
 By the dismal tarns and pools
 Where dwell the Ghouls,-
 By each spot the most unholy-
 In each nook most melancholy-
 There the traveller meets aghast
 Sheeted Memories of the Past-
 Shrouded forms that start and sigh
 As they pass the wanderer by-
 White-robed forms of friends long given,
 In agony, to the Earth- and Heaven.

 For the heart whose woes are legion
 'Tis a peaceful, soothing region-
 For the spirit that walks in shadow
 'Tis- oh, 'tis an Eldorado!
 But the traveller, travelling through it,
 May not- dare not openly view it!
 Never its mysteries are exposed
 To the weak human eye unclosed;
 So wills its King, who hath forbid
 The uplifting of the fringed lid;
 And thus the sad Soul that here passes
 Beholds it but through darkened glasses.

 By a route obscure and lonely,
 Haunted by ill angels only,
 Where an Eidolon, named NIGHT,
 On a black throne reigns upright,
 I have wandered home but newly
 From this ultimate dim Thule.