for annie

Thank Heaven! the crisis - the danger is past, and the lingering illness is over at last - and the fever called “Living” is conquered at last. Sadly, I know I am shorn of my strength, and no muscle I move as I lie at full length - but no matter! I feel I am better at length. And I rest so composedly, now, in my bed that any beholder might fancy me dead - might start at beholding me, thinking me dead. The moaning and groaning, the sighing and sobbing, are quieted now, with that horrible throbbing at heart: ah, that horrible, horrible throbbing! The sickness - the nausea - the pitiless pain - have ceased, with the fever that maddened my brain - with the fever called “Living” that burned in my brain. And oh! Of all tortures that torture the worst has abated - the terrible torture of thirst for the naphthaline river of Passion accurst: I have drunk of a water that quenches all thirst: Of a water that flows, with a lullaby sound, from a spring but a very few feet under ground - from a cavern not very far down under ground. And ah! Let it never be foolishly said that my room it is gloomy and narrow my bed; For man never slept in a different bed - and, to sleep, you must slumber in just such a bed. My tantalized spirit here blandly reposes, forgetting, or never regretting its roses - its old agitations of myrtles and roses: For now, while so quietly lying, it fancies a holier odor about it, of pansies - a rosemary odor, commingled with pansies - with rue and the beautiful puritan pansies. And so it lies happily, bathing in many a dream of the truth and the beauty of Annie - drowned in a bath of the tresses of Annie. She tenderly kissed me, she fondly caressed, and then I fell gently to sleep on her breast - deeply to sleep from the heaven of her breast. When the light was extinguished, she covered me warm, and she prayed to the angels to keep me from harm - to the queen of the angels to shield me from harm. And I lie so composedly, now, in my bed, (Knowing her love) that you fancy me dead - and I rest so contentedly, now, in my bed, (With her love at my breast) that you fancy me dead - that you shudder to look at me, thinking me dead. But my heart it is brighter than all of the many stars in the sky, for it sparkles with Annie - it glows with the light of the love of my Annie - with the thought of the light of the eyes of my Annie.