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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner | The Rime of the Ancient Mariner in Seven Parts - Page 3

The cold sweat melted from their limbs,(250)
Nor rot nor reek did they:
The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.

But the curse liveth for
him in the eye of the
dead men.


An orphan's curse would drag to Hell
A spirit from on high;(255)
But oh! more horrible than that
Is a curse in a dead man's eye!
Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.
The moving Moon went up the sky,(260)
And no where did abide:
Softly she was going up,
And a star or two beside.

In his loneliness and
fixedness he yearneth
towards the journeying
Moon, and the stars
that still sojourn, yet
still move onward; and
everywhere the blue
sky belongs to them,
and is their appointed
rest and their native
country and their own
natural homes, which
they enter unan
nounced, as lords that
are certainly expected,
and yet there is a
silent joy at their
arrival.


Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread;(265)
But where the ship's huge shadow lay,
The charmed water burnt alway
A still and awful red.
Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes:(270)
They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.

By the light of the
Moon he beholdeth
God's creatures of the
great calm.


Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:(275)
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:(280)
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.

Their beauty and their
happiness.

He blesseth them in
his heart.


The selfsame moment I could pray;(285)
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.

The spell begins to
break.


Part the Fifth.

Oh sleep! it is a gentle thing,
Beloved from pole to pole!(290)
To Mary Queen the praise be given!
She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven,
That slid into my soul.
The silly buckets on the deck,
That had so long remained,(295)
I dreamt that they were filled with dew;
And when I awoke, it rained.

By grace of the holy
Mother, the ancient
Mariner is refreshed
with rain.


My lips were wet, my throat was cold,
My garments all were dank;
Sure I had drunken in my dreams,(300)
And still my body drank.
I moved, and could not feel my limbs:
I was so light—almost
I thought that I had died in sleep,
And was a blessed Ghost.(305)
And soon I heard a roaring wind:
It did not come anear;
But with its sound it shook the sails,
That were so thin and sere.

He heareth sounds and
seeth strange sights
and commotions in the
sky and the element.


The upper air burst into life!(310)
And a hundred fire-flags sheen,
To and fro they were hurried about!
And to and fro, and in and out,
The wan stars danced between.
And the coming wind did roar more loud,(315)
And the sails did sigh like sedge;
And the rain poured down from one black cloud;
The Moon was at its edge.
The thick black cloud was cleft and still
The Moon was at its side:(320)
Like waters shot from some high crag,
The lightning fell with never a jag,
A river steep and wide.
The loud wind never reached the ship,
Yet now the ship moved on!(325)
Beneath the lightning and the Moon
The dead men gave a groan.

The bodies of the ship's
crew are inspired, and
the ship moves on;


They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;
It had been strange, even in a dream,(330)
To have seen those dead men rise.
The helmsman steered, the ship moved on;
Yet never a breeze up-blew;
The mariners all 'gan work the ropes,
Where they were wont to do:(335)
They raised their limbs like lifeless tools—
We were a ghastly crew.
The body of my brother's son,
Stood by me, knee to knee:
The body and I pulled at one rope,(340)
But he said nought to me.
“I fear thee, ancient Mariner!”
Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest!
'Twas not those souls that fled in pain,
Which to their corses came again,(345)
But a troop of spirits blest:

But not by the souls
of the men, nor by
demons of earth or
middle air, but by a
blessed troop of
angelic spirits, sent
down by the invoca
tion of the guardian
saint.


For when it dawned—they dropped their arms,
And clustered round the mast;
Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths,
And from their bodies passed.(350)
Around, around, flew each sweet sound,
Then darted to the Sun;
Slowly the sounds came back again,
Now mixed, now one by one.
Sometimes a-dropping from the sky(355)
I heard the sky-lark sing;
Sometimes all little birds that are,
How they seemed to fill the sea and air
With their sweet jargoning!
And now 'twas like all instruments,(360)
Now like a lonely flute;
And now it is an angel's song,
That makes the Heavens be mute.
It ceased; yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,(365)
A noise like of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.
Till noon we quietly sailed on,(370)
Yet never a breeze did breathe:
Slowly and smoothly went the ship,
Moved onward from beneath.
Under the keel nine fathom deep,
From the land of mist and snow,(375)
The spirit slid: and it was he
That made the ship to go.
The sails at noon left off their tune,
And the ship stood still also.

The lonesome Spirit
from the South Pole
carries on the ship
as far as the Line,
in obedience to the
angelic troop, but still
requireth vengeance.


The Sun, right up above the mast,(380)
Had fixed her to the ocean:
But in a minute she 'gan stir,
With a short uneasy motion—
Backwards and forwards half her length
With a short uneasy motion.(385)
  • The bodies of the dead crew members, which do not decay, continue to stare at the Mariner with the same expressions and cursing of him that they had before they died.
  • a light coating of frost
  • always
  • The Mariner sees glowing sea life and feels appreciative of living things. When he “blesses” them, the albatross falls off his neck. This act begins the Mariner's redemption.
  • Mary, the mother of Jesus; in the Catholic faith, she is called “The Queen of Heaven.”
  • useless
  • withered, dry
  • The bodies of the dead crew come “alive” and work the ship.
  • accustomed to
  • nothing
  • corpses
  • The spirit of the slain albatross, nine fathoms down, is making the ship move.
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