Text: Edgar Allan Poe, “Tamerlane” (Comparative Text - TAOP, Wilmer-MS and ATMP)

{{1827-01:

Stanza: I.

Line-01-001 [[indent]] I have sent for thee, holy friar; (1)

Line-01-002 But ’twas not with the drunken hope,

Line-01-003 Which is but agony of desire

Line-01-004 To shun the fate, with which to cope

Line-01-005 Is more than crime may dare to dream,

Line-01-006 That I have call’d thee at this hour:

Line-01-007 Such father is not my theme —

Line-01-008 Nor am I mad, to deem that power

Line-01-009 Of earth may shrive me of the sin

Line-01-010 Unearthly pride hath revell’d in —

Line-01-011 I would not call thee fool, old man,

Line-01-012 But hope is not a gift of thine;

Line-01-013 If I can hope (O God! I can)

Line-01-014 It falls from an eternal shrine.

Stanza: II.

Line-01-015 [[indent]] The gay wall of this gaudy tower

Line-01-016 Grows dim around me — death is near.

Line-01-017 I had not thought, until this hour

Line-01-018 When passing from the earth, that ear

Line-01-019 Of any, were it not the shade

Line-01-020 Of one whom in life I made

Line-01-021 All mystery but a simple name,

Line-01-022 Might know the secret of a spirit

Line-01-023 Bow’d down in sorrow, and in shame. —

Line-01-024 Shame said'st thou?

Line-01-025 [[indent]] Aye I did inherit

Line-01-026 That hatred [[hated]] portion, with the fame,

Line-01-027 The worldly glory, which has shown

Line-01-028 A demon-light around my throne,

Line-01-029 Scorching my sear’d heart with a pain

Line-01-030 Not Hell shall make me fear again.

//1829-03:

Stanza: 1

Line-03-001 Kind solace in a dying hour! —

Line-03-002 [[indent]] Such, father, is not (now) my theme —

Line-03-003 I will not madly deem that power

Line-03-004 [[indent]] Of Earth may shrive me of the sin

Line-03-005 [[indent]] Unearthly pride hath revell’d in —

Line-03-006 [[indent]] I have no time to dote or dream:

Line-03-007 You call it hope — that fire of fire!

Line-03-008 It is but agony of desire:

Line-03-009 If I can hope — Oh God! I can —

Line-03-010 [[indent]] Its fount is holier — more divine —

Line-03-011 I would not call thee fool, old man,

Line-03-012 [[indent]] But such is not a gift of thine.

Stanza: 2

Line-03-013 Know thou the secret of a spirit

Line-03-014 [[indent]] Bow’d from its wild pride into shame.

Line-03-015 O! yearning heart! I did inherit

Line-03-016 [[indent]] Thy withering portion with the fame,

Line-03-017 The searing glory which hath shone

Line-03-018 Amid the jewels of my throne,

Line-03-019 Halo of Hell! and with a pain

Line-03-020 Not Hell shall make me fear again —

Line-03-021 O! craving heart, for the lost flowers

Line-03-022 And sunshine of my summer hours!

Line-03-023 Th’ undying voice of that dead time,

Line-03-024 With its interminable chime,

Line-03-025 Rings, in the spirit of a spell,

Line-03-026 Upon thy emptiness — a knell.

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-042 And my brain drank their venom then,

Line-01-043 When after day of perilous strife

Line-01-044 With chamois, I would seize his den

Line-01-045 And slumber, in my pride of power,

Line-01-046 The infant monarch of the hour —

Line-01-047 For, with the mountain dew by night,

Line-01-048 My soul imbib’d unhallow’d feeling;

Line-01-049 And I would feel its essence stealing

Line-01-050 In dreams upon me — while the light

Line-01-051 Flashing from cloud that hover’d o’er,

Line-01-052 Would seem to my half closing eye

//1829-03:

Line-03-038 And, I believe, the winged strife

Line-03-039 And tumult of the headlong air

Line-03-040 Hath nestl’d in my very hair.

Stanza: {{1829-03: 5 }}

Line-03-041 So late from Heaven — that dew — it fell

Line-03-042 [[indent]] (’Mid dreams of an unholy night)

Line-03-043 Upon me — with the touch of Hell,

Line-03-044 [[indent]] While the red flashing of the light

Line-03-045 From clouds that hung, like banners, o’er,

Line-03-046 [[indent]] Appeared to my half-closing eye

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Stanza: {{1827-01: [[blank line, but not numbered as a new stanza]] //1828-02: 6 }}

Line-01-071: {{1827-01: [[indent]] }} The storm had ceas’d {{1827-01: — and //1828-02: & }} I awoke —

Line-01-072: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} Its spirit cradled me to sleep,

Line-01-073: And as it pass’d me by {{1827-01: , }} there broke

Line-01-074: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} Strange light upon me, tho’ it were

Line-01-075: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} My soul in mystery to {{1827-01: sleep [[steep]] //1828-02: steep }} :

Line-01-076: For I was not as I had been {{1827-01: ; //1828-02: — }}

Line-01-077: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} The child of Nature, without care,

Line-01-078: Or thought {{1827-01: , }} save of the passing scene. {{1827-01: — }}

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-098: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} The earth reel {{1827-01: — and //1828-02: , & }} the vision gone?

Line-01-099: {{1827-01: And I have //1828-02: So have I }} held to {{1827-01: mem’ry's //1828-02: Memory's }} eye

Line-01-100: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} One object {{1827-01: — // 1828-02: , }} and but one {{1827-01: — //1828-02: , }} until

{{1828-02: [[the first part of the 1828 manuscript ends at this point]] }}

Line-01-101 Its very form hath pass’d me by,

Line-01-102 But left its influence with me still.

//1829-03:

Line-03-084 The letters — with their meaning — melt

Line-03-085 [[indent]] To fantasies — with none.

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-03:

Stanza: {{1827-01: VI. }}

Line-01-103 [[indent]] ’Tis not to thee that I should name —

Line-01-104 Thou can'st not — would'st not dare to think

Line-01-105 The magic empire of a flame

Line-01-106 Which ev’n upon this perilous brink

Line-01-107 Hath fix’d my soul, tho’ unforgiv’n

Line-01-108 By what it lost for passion — Heav’n.

Line-01-109 I lov’d — and O, how tenderly!

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-112 Tho’ then its passion could not be:

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-133 She’d look up in my wilder’d eye —

}}

{{1829-03:

Line-03-000 But turn’d on me her quiet eye!

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-137 [[indent]] The hallow’d mem’ry of those years

Line-01-138 Comes o’er me in these lonely hours,

Line-01-139 And, with sweet lovliness, appears

Line-01-140 As perfume of strange summer flow’rs;

Line-01-141 Of flow’rs which we have known before

Line-01-142 In infancy, which seen, recall

Line-01-143 To mind — not flow’rs alone — but more

Line-01-144 Our earthly life, and love — and all.

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-151: My phrenzy [[frenzy]] to her bosom taught:

Line-01-152: We still were young: no purer thought

Line-01-153: Dwell [[Dwelt]] in a seraph's breast than thine; (3)

Line-01-154: For passionate love is still divine:

//1828-02:

Line-02-150: There were no holier thoughts than thine.

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-183: (I speak thus openly to thee,

Line-01-184: ’Twere folly now to veil a thought

Line-01-185: With which this aching, [[sic]] breast is fraught)

Line-01-186: The soul which feels its innate right —

Line-01-187: The mystic empire and high power

Line-01-188: Giv’n by the energetic might

Line-01-189: Of Genius, at its natal hour;

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-210: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} Which, of light step, flies with the dew {{1827-01: , }}

Line-01-211: {{1828-02: ( }} That kindling thought {{1828-02: ) }} — did not the beam

//1829-03:

Line-03-000: [[indent]] Upon the vapor of the dew

Line-03-000: My own had past, did not the beam

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-213: The {{1827-01: livelong //1828-02: live-long }} summer day, oppress

//1829-03:

Line-03-000: The minute — the hour — the day — oppress

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-220: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} Her {{1827-01: own fair // 1828-02: magic }} hand had rear’d around {{1827-01: , }}

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-222: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} {{1827-01: Which as it were, in fairy //1828-02: Encircling with a glitt’ring }} bound

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-223: Embrac’d two hamlets — those our own —

Line-01-224: Peacefully happy — yet alone —

//1828-02:

Line-02-222: Of diamond sunshine & sweet spray

Line-02-223: Two mossy huts of the Taglay.

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Stanza: {{1827-01: XI. //1828-02: 16 }}

Line-01-235: {{1827-01: [[indent]] }} There {{1827-01: — // 1828-02: , }} in that hour {{1827-01: — //1828-02: , }} a thought came o’er

Line-01-236: My mind {{1827-01: , }} it had not known before —

Line-01-237: To leave her while we both were young {{1827-01: , — //1828-02: : }}

Line-01-238: To follow my high fate among

Line-01-239: The strife of nations, {{1827-01: and //1828-02: & }} redeem

Line-01-240: The idle words {{1827-01: , }} which, as a dream {{1828-02: , }}

Line-01-241: Now sounded to her heedless ear —

Line-01-242: I held no doubt {{1827-01: — //1828-02: , }} I knew no fear

Line-01-243: Of peril in my wild career {{1827-01: ; //1828-02: — }}

Line-01-244: To gain an empire {{1827-01: , and //1828-02: & }} throw down

Line-01-245: As nuptial dowry {{1828-02: — }} a queen's crown {{1827-01: [[,]] }}

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-246: The only feeling which possest,

Line-01-247: With her own image, my fond breast —

//1828-02:

Line-02-245: The undying hope which now oppress’d

Line-02-246: A spirit ne’er to be at rest.

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-248: Who {{1827-01: , }} that had known the {{1827-01: secret //1828-02: silent }} thought

Line-01-249: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} Of a young peasant's bosom then {{1827-01: , }}

Line-01-250: Had deem’d him, in compassion, aught

Line-01-251: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} But one {{1827-01: , }} whom {{1827-01: phantasy //1828-02: Phantasy }} had led

Line-01-252: {{1828-02: [[indent]] }} {{1827-01: Astray from reason — Among //1828-02: Her mantel over? among }} men

//1829-03:

Line-03-000: I wrapp’d myself in grandeur then,

Line-03-000: [[indent]] And donn’d a visionary crown ——

Line-03-000: [[indent]] Yet it was not Fantasy

Line-03-000: [[indent]] Had thrown her mantle over me —

}}

{{1828-02; 1829-03:

Line-02-253: And crouches to a keeper's hand —

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-257: With thoughts such feeling can command;

Line-01-258: Uncheck’d by sarcasm, and scorn

Line-01-259: Of those, who hardly will conceive

Line-01-260: That any should become “great,” born (5)

Line-01-261: In their own sphere — will not believe

Line-01-262: That they shall stoop in life to one

Line-01-263: Whom daily they are wont to see

Line-01-264: Familiarly — whom Fortune's sun

Line-01-265: Hath ne’er shone dazzlingly upon

Line-01-266: Lowly — and of their own degree —

Stanza: {{1827-01: XII. }}

Line-01-267: [[indent]] I pictur’d to my fancy's eye

Line-01-268: Her silent, deep astonishment,

Line-01-269: When, a few fleeting years gone by,

Line-01-270: (For short the time my high hope lent

Line-01-271: To its most desperate intent,)

Line-01-272: She might recall in him, whom Fame

Line-01-273: Had gilded with a conquerer's name,

Line-01-274: (With glory — such as might inspire

Line-01-275: Perforce, a passing thought of one,

Line-01-276: Whom she had deem’d in his own fire

Line-01-277: Wither’d and blasted; who had gone

Line-01-278: A traitor, violate of the truth

Line-01-279: So plighted in his early youth,)

Line-01-280: Her own Alexis, who should plight (6)

Line-01-281: The love he plighted then — again,

Line-01-282: And raise his infancy's delight,

Line-01-283: The bride and queen of Tamerlane —

Stanza: {{1827-01: XIII. }}

Line-01-284: [[indent]] One noon of a bright summer's day

Line-01-285: I pass’d from out the matted bow’r

Line-01-286: Where in a deep, still slumber lay

Line-01-287: My Ada. In that peaceful hour,

Line-01-288: A silent gaze was my farewell.

Line-01-289: I had no other solace — then

Line-01-290: T’awake her, and a falsehood tell

Line-01-291: Of a feign’d journey, were again

Line-01-292: To trust the weakness of my heart

Line-01-293: To her soft thrilling voice:  To part

Line-01-294: Thus, haply, while in sleep she dream’d

Line-01-295: Of long delight, nor yet had deem’d

Line-01-296: Awake, that I had held a thought

Line-01-297: Of parting, were with madness fraught;

Line-01-298: I knew not woman's heart, alas!

Line-01-299: Tho’ lov’d, and loving — let it pass. —

Stanza: {{1827-01: XIV. }}

Line-01-300: [[indent]] I went from out the matted bow’r,

Line-01-301: And hurried madly on my way:

Line-01-302: And felt, with ev’ry flying hour,

Line-01-303: That bore me from my home, more gay;

Line-01-304: There is of earth an agony

Line-01-305: Which, ideal, still may be

Line-01-306: The worst ill of mortality,

Line-01-307: ’Tis bliss, in its own reality,

Line-01-308: Too real, to his breast who lives

Line-01-309: Not within himself but gives

Line-01-310: A portion of his willing soul

Line-01-311: To God, and to the great whole —

Line-01-313: To him, whose loving spirit will dwell

Line-01-313: With Nature, in her wild paths; tell

Line-01-314: Of her wond’rous ways, and telling bless

Line-01-315: Her overpow’ring loveliness!

Line-01-316: A more than agony to him

Line-01-317: Whose failing sight will grow dim

Line-01-318: With its own living gaze upon

Line-01-319: That loveliness around: the sun —

Line-01-320: The blue sky — the misty light

Line-01-321: Of the pale cloud therein, whose hue

Line-01-322: Is grace to its heav’nly bed of blue;

Line-01-323: Dim! tho’ looking on all bright!

Line-01-324: O God! when the thoughts that may not pass

Line-01-325: Will burst upon him, and alas!

Line-01-326: For the flight on Earth to Fancy giv’n,

Line-01-327: There are no words —— unless of Heav’n.

Stanza: {{1827-01: XV. //1828-02: 18 }}

}}

{{1829-03:

Line-03-173 Falling — her veriest stepping-stone

Line-03-174 Shall form the pedestal of a throne —

}}

{{1827-01; 1829-03:

Line-01-336: Striding o’er empires haughtily

Line-01-337: A diadem’d outlaw {{1827-01: ! //1829-03: — }}

//1828-02:

Line-02-335: With victory, on victory,

Line-02-336: Redoubling age! and more, I ween,

}}

{{1827-01; 1828-02:

Line-01-338: {{1827-01: The Zinghis’ yet re-echoing //1828-02: More than the Zinghis in his }} fame {{1827-01: . (9) // 1828-02: — }}

Line-01-339: And now what has he? {{1827-01: what! //1828-02: even }} a name.

Stanza: {{1828-02: [[new stanza] 19 }}

Line-01-340: The sound of revelry {{1827-01: by //1828-02: to }} night

Line-01-341: Comes o’er me, with the mingled voice

Line-01-342: {{1827-01: Of //1828-02: From }} many with a breast as light {{1827-01: , }}

Line-01-343: As if ’twere not the dying hour

Line-01-344: Of one {{1827-01: , }} in whom they did rejoice —

Line-01-345: As in a leader, haply {{1827-01: — //1828-02: ; }} Power

Line-01-346: Its venom secretly imparts {{1827-01: ; //1828-02: — }}

Line-01-347: {{1827-01: Nothing have I //1828-01: And I have naught }} with human hearts.

}}

{{1829-03:

Stanza: 18

Line-03-179 O! human love! thou spirit given,

Line-03-180 On Earth, of all we hope in Heaven!

Line-03-181 Which fall'st into the soul like rain

Line-03-182 Upon the Siroc wither’d plain,

Line-03-183 And failing in thy power to bless

Line-03-184 But leav'st the heart a wilderness!

Line-03-185 Idea! which bindest life around

Line-03-186 With music of so strange a sound

Line-03-187 And beauty of so wild a birth —

Line-03-188 Farewell! for I have won the Earth!

Stanza: 19

Line-03-189 When Hope, the eagle that tower’d, could see

Line-03-190 [[indent]] No cliff beyond him in the sky,

Line-03-191 His pinions were bent droopingly —

Line-03-192 [[indent]] And homeward turn’d his soften’d eye.

}}

{{1827-01:

Stanza: {{1827-01: XVI. }}

Line-01-348 [[indent]] When Fortune mark’d me for her own,

Line-01-349 And my proud hopes had reach’d a throne

Line-01-350 (It boots me not, good friar, to tell

Line-01-351 A tale the world but knows to [[too]] well,

Line-01-352 How by what hidden deeds of might,

Line-01-353 I clamber’d to the tottering height,)

Line-01-354 I still was young; and well I ween

Line-01-355 My spirit what it e’er had been.

Line-01-356 My eyes were still on pomp and power,

Line-01-357 My wilder’d heart was far away,

Line-01-358 In vallies of the wild Taglay,

Line-01-359 In mine own Ada's matted bow’r.

Line-01-360 I dwelt not long in Samarcand

Line-01-361 Ere, in a peasant's lowly guise,

Line-01-362 I sought my long—abandon’d [[long-abandon’d]] land,

Line-01-363 By sunset did its mountains rise

Line-01-364 In dusky grandeur to my eyes:

Line-01-365 But as I wander’d on the way

Line-01-366 My heart sunk with the sun's ray.

Line-01-367 To him, who still would gaze upon

Line-01-368 The glory of the summer sun,

}}

{{1829-03:

Line-03-195 To him who still would look upon

Line-03-196 The glory of the summer sun.

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-381 As the portrait of one after death;

Line-01-382 A likeness taken when the breath

Line-01-383 Of young life, and the fire o’ the eye

Line-01-384 Had lately been but had pass’d by.

Line-01-385 ’Tis thus when the lovely summer sun

Line-01-386 Of our boyhood, his course hath run:

//1829-03:

Line-03-207 [So like you gather in your breath]

Line-03-208 A portrait taken after death.

Line-03-209 And boyhood is a summer sun

Line-03-210 Whose waning is the dreariest one —

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-390 Let life, then, as the day-flow’r, fall —

Line-01-391 The trancient, passionate day-flow’r, (11)

Line-01-392 Withering at the ev’ning hour.

}}

{{1827-01:

Line-01-396 In vacant idleness of woe.

Line-01-397 There met me on its threshold stone

Line-01-398 A mountain hunter, I had known

Line-01-399 In childhood but he knew me not.

Line-01-400 Something he spoke of the old cot:

Line-01-401 It had seen better days, he said;

Line-01-402 There rose a fountain once, and there

Line-01-403 Full many a fair flow’r rais’d its head:

Line-01-404 But she who rear’d them was long dead,

Line-01-405 And in such follies had no part,

Line-01-406 What was there left me now? despair —

Line-01-407 A kingdom for a broken — heart.

//1829-03:

Line-03-218 [[indent]] And, tho’ my tread was soft and low,

Line-03-219 A voice came from the threshold stone

Line-03-220 Of one whom I had earlier known —

Line-03-221 [[indent]] O! I defy thee, Hell, to show

Line-03-222 [[indent]] On beds of fire that burn below,

Line-03-223 [[indent]] A humbler heart — a deeper wo —

Stanza: 23

Line-03-224 Father, I firmly do believe —

Line-03-225 [[indent]] I know — for Death who comes for me

Line-03-226 [[indent]] From regions of the blest afar,

Line-03-227 Where there is nothing to deceive,

Line-03-228 [[indent]] Hath left his iron gate ajar,

Line-03-229 [[indent]] And rays of truth you cannot see

Line-03-230 [[indent]] Are flashing thro’ Eternity ——

Line-03-231 I do believe that Eblis hath

Line-03-232 A snare in ev’ry human path —

Line-03-233 Else how, when in the holy grove

Line-03-234 I wandered of the idol, Love,

Line-03-235 Who daily scents his snowy wings

Line-03-236 With incense of burnt offerings

Line-03-237 From the most unpolluted things,

Line-03-238 Whose pleasant bowers are yet so riven

Line-03-239 Above with trelliced rays from Heaven

Line-03-240 No mote may shun — no tiniest fly

Line-03-241 The light’ning of his eagle eye —

Line-03-242 How was it that Ambition crept,

Line-03-243 [[indent]] Unseen, amid the revels there,

Line-03-244 Till growing bold, he laughed and leapt

Line-03-245 [[indent]] In the tangles of Love's very hair?

}}