Kubla Khan

¹In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

²A stately pleasure-dome decree:

³Where Alph, the sacred river, ran

⁴Through caverns measureless to man

⁵Down to a sunless sea.

⁶So twice five miles of fertile ground

⁷With walls and towers were girdled round:

⁸And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,

⁹Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;

¹⁰And here were forests ancient as the hills,

¹¹Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

¹²But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted

¹³Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!

¹⁴A savage place! as holy and enchanted

¹⁵As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted

¹⁶By woman wailing for her demon-lover!

¹⁷And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,

¹⁸As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,

¹⁹A mighty fountain momently was forced:

²⁰Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst

²¹Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,

²²Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail:

²³And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever

²⁴It flung up momently the sacred river.

²⁵Five miles meandering with a mazy motion

²⁶Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,

²⁷Then reached the caverns measureless to man,

²⁸And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:

²⁹And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far

³⁰Ancestral voices prophesying war!

³¹The shadow of the dome of pleasure

³²Floated midway on the waves;

³³Where was heard the mingled measure

³⁴From the fountain and the caves.

³⁵It was a miracle of rare device,

³⁶A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

³⁷A damsel with a dulcimer

³⁸In a vision once I saw:

³⁹It was an Abyssinian maid,

⁴⁰And on her dulcimer she played,

⁴¹Singing of Mount Abora.

⁴²Could I revive within me

⁴³Her symphony and song,

⁴⁴To such a deep delight 'twould win me,

⁴⁵That with music loud and long,

⁴⁶I would build that dome in air,

⁴⁷That sunny dome! those caves of ice!

⁴⁸And all who heard should see them there,

⁴⁹And all should cry, Beware! Beware!

⁵⁰His flashing eyes, his floating hair!

⁵¹Weave a circle round him thrice,

⁵²And close your eyes with holy dread,

⁵³For he on honey-dew hath fed,

⁵⁴And drunk the milk of Paradise.