The Complete Poetry Quotes

“Twas noontide of summer,
And mid-time of night;
And stars, in their orbits,
Shone pale, thro' the light
Of the brighter, cold moon,
'Mid planets her slaves,
Herself in the Heavens,
Her beam on the waves.
I gazed awhile
On her cold smile;
Too cold–too cold for me-
There pass'd, as a shroud,
A fleecy cloud,
And I turned away to thee,
Proud Evening Star,
In thy glory afar,
And dearer thy beam shall be;
For joy to my heart
Is the proud part
Thou bearest in Heaven at night,
And more I admire
Thy distant fire,
Than that colder, lowly light.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“We grew in age - and love - together
Roaming the forest, and the wild;
My breast her shield in wintry weather -
And, when the friendly sunshine smil'd,
And she would mark the opening skies,
I saw no Heaven - but in her eyes.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“Ah, not in knowledge is happiness, but in the acquisition of knowledge! In forever knowing, we are forever blessed; but to know all, were the curse of a fiend.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“I saw no heaven — but in her eyes.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“O craving heart, for the lost flowers/ And sunshine of my summer hours!/ The undying voice of that dead time,/ With its interminable chime,/ Rings in the spirit of a spell, / Upon thy emptiness--a knell. / I have not always been as now:”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“And boyhood is a summer sun / Whose waning is the dreariest one-- / For all we live to know is known, / And all we seek to keep hath flown--”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“Thou wouldst be loved?—then let thy heart From its present pathway part not; Being everything which now thou art, Be nothing which thou art not. So with the world thy gentle ways, Thy grace, thy more than beauty, Shall be an endless theme of praise. And love a simple duty.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Alas! for that accursed time
They bore thee o'er the billow,
From love to titled age and crime,
And an unholy pillow!
From me, and from our misty clime,
Where weeps the silver willow!”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“At midnight, in the month of June, I stand beneath the mystic moon. An opiate vapor, dewy, dim, Exhales from out her golden rim, And, softly dripping, drop by drop, Upon the quiet mountain top,”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Our talk had been serious and sober,
But our thoughts they were palsied and sere -
For we knew not the month was October,
And we marked not the night of the year -
(Ah, night of all nights in the year!)
We noted not the dim lake of Auber -
(Though once we had journeyed down here) -
Remembered not the dank tarn of Auber,
Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“Oh, wär mein junges Leben doch ein Traum. Und würd doch mein Geist nicht wach, bis das der Strahl der Ewigkeit den Morgen brächte. Obwohl der Traum von schlimmen Kummer war, er war doch besser als die wirklichkeit des wachen Lebens für den, dessen herz gleich von Geburt an auf der Erde sein muss - Ein Chaos aus der tiefsten Leidenschaft.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“It was night in the lonesome October
Of my most immemorial year...”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“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.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“if passion it can properly be called, was of the most thoroughly romantic, shadowy, and imaginative character. It was born of the hour, and of the youthful necessity to love. It had no peculiar regard to the person, or to the character, or to the reciprocating affection... Any maiden, not immediately and positively repulsive,”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Other friends have flown before-- On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Complete Poetical Works

“human ingenuity could not construct a cipher which human ingenuity could not solve.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“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.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore." And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming, And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor; And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted—nevermore!”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“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 gray 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.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore. “Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven, Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the Nightly shore— Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!” Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poems of Edgar Allan Poe

“Thy soul shall find itself alone 'Mid dark thoughts of the gray tombstone Not one, of all the crowd, to pry Into thine hour of secrecy. Be silent in that solitude Which is not loneliness—for then The spirits of the dead who stood In life before thee are again In death around thee—and their will Shall overshadow thee: be still. The night—tho' clear—shall frown— And the stars shall not look down From their high thrones in the Heaven, With light like Hope to mortals given— But their red orbs, without beam, To thy weariness shall seem As a burning and a fever Which would cling to thee forever. Now are thoughts thou shalt not banish— Now are visions ne'er to vanish— From thy spirit shall they pass No more—like dew-drops from the grass. The breeze—the breath of God—is still—”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells-- From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Complete Poetical Works

“But, father, there liv’d one who, then, Then—in my boyhood—when their fire Burn’d with a still intenser glow (For passion must, with youth, expire)”
― Edgar Allan Poe, The Complete Poetry

“These trifles are collected and republished chiefly with a view to their redemption from the many improvements to which they have been subjected while going at random the" rounds of the press. "I am naturally anxious that what I have written should circulate as I wrote it, if it circulate at all. In defence of my own taste, nevertheless, it is incumbent upon me to say that I think nothing in this volume of much value to the public, or very creditable to myself. Events not to be controlled have prevented me from making, at any time, any serious effort in what, under happier circumstances, would have been the field of my choice. With me poetry has been not a purpose, but a passion; and the passions should be held in reverence: they must not—they cannot at will be excited, with an eye to the paltry compensations, or the more paltry commendations, of mankind. 1845. E. A. P.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“I stand amid the roar Of a surf-tormented shore, And I hold within my hand Grains of the golden sand— How few! yet how they creep Through my fingers to the deep While I weep—while I weep!”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Nothing further then he uttered--not a feather then he fluttered-- Till I scarcely more than muttered," Other friends have flown before-- On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before. "Then the bird said," Nevermore.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Complete Poetical Works

“And travellers, now, within that valley, Through the red-litten windows see Vast forms, that move fantastically To a discordant melody, While, like a ghastly rapid river, Through the pale door A hideous throng rush out forever And laugh—but smile no more.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Some human memories and tearful lore, Render him terrorless: his name's" No More.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works

“Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!" Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore.”
― Edgar Allan Poe, Edgar Allan Poe's Complete Poetical Works