In this forest, each night seemeth haunted and dark;
The cold Autumn landscape relentlessly stark;
While the beasts of the night snarl and bark–
As in legends of Devils and Ghosts.
I can hear the melancholy wind as it moans,
Swirling around the trees and the stones,
Making the branches to rattle like bones,
As night birds cry out from their posts.
In the dying orange light of the fire
The shadows a-dancing begin to inspire
Shimmering shapes all dreadful and dire
Surrounding me here in my room.
I glance at the door, to be sure of the lock,
Another wind gust makes the cabin walls rock.
And I fancy I hear an inhuman voice talk
And whisper of pain and of doom.
Symbols, shapes, and puzzle pieces–
Queer and ancient Formulae–
All appear upon the crumbled desert wall.
Obscured with sands from Eastern breezes,
Here are signs, but none can see
What things they signified before the fall.
The All-Seeing Eye, the Winged God;
A haunting vigil they are holding here,
Exuding pow’r where’er their shapes recur.
This is the ground that prophets trod–
And fled as well, perhaps in fear,
As many a fallen Idol will aver.
At the base, a bony memory
Holds forth the remnant of a hand,
Bleached white from innumerable days.
Whether he is cautioning, or he
Is beckoning–who can understand
The meaning of that vacant gaze?