To the lake

In Spring of youth it was my lot                   
To haunt of the wide world a spot                   
The which I could not love the less -                   
So lovely was the loneliness                   
Of a wild lake, with black rock bound,                   
And the tall pines that towered around.                   
                  
But when the night had thrown her pall                   
Upon that spot, as upon all,                   
And the mystic wind went by                   
Murmuring in melody -                   
Then - ah, then, I would awake                   
To the terror of the lone lake.                   
                  
Yet that terror was not fright,                   
But a tremulous delight -                   
A feeling not the jewelled mine                   
Could teach or bribe me to define -                   
Nor Love - although the love were thine.                   
                  
Death was in that poisonous wave,                   
And in its gulf a fitting grave                   
For him who thence could solace bring                   
To his lone imagining -                   
Whose solitary soul could make                   
An Eden of that dim lake.                   

Edgar Allan Poe