Annabel Lee

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

Annabel Lee (1849)

It was many and many a year ago,

    In a kingdom by the sea,

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

    Bu 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 wingéd 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 could, chilling

    My beautiful Annabel Lee;

So that her highborn kinsmen 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:--

Foe the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams

    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 the sepulchre there by the sea—

In her tomb by the sounding sea.