Kubla Khan

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan     A stately pleasure-dome decree:     Where Alph, the sacred river, ran     Through caverns measureless to man     Down to a sunless sea.     So twice five miles of fertile ground     With walls and towers were girdled round:     And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,     Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;     And here were forests ancient as the hills,     Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.     But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted     Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!     A savage place! as holy and enchanted     As eer beneath a waning moon was haunted     By woman wailing for her demon-lover!     And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,     As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,     A mighty fountain momently was forced:     Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst     Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,     Or chaffy grain beneath the threshers flail:     And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever     It flung up momently the sacred river.     Five miles meandering with a mazy motion     Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,     Then reached the caverns measureless to man,     And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:     And mid this tumult Kubla heard from far     Ancestral voices prophesying war!     The shadow of the dome of pleasure     Floated midway on the waves;     Where was heard the mingled measure     From the fountain and the caves.     It was a miracle of rare device,     A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!     A damsel with a dulcimer     In a vision once I saw:     It was an Abyssinian maid,     And on her dulcimer she played,     Singing of Mount Abora.     Could I revive within me     Her symphony and song,     To such a deep delight twould win me     That with music loud and long     I would build that dome in air,     That sunny dome! those caves of ice!     And all who heard should see them there,     And all should cry, Beware! Beware!     His flashing eyes, his floating hair!     Weave a circle round him thrice,     And close your eyes with holy dread,     For he on honey-dew hath fed     And drunk the milk of Paradise.