Status Updates From Pale Fire (Modern Classics)

And blood-black nothingness began to spin
A system of cells interlinked within
Cells interlinked within cells interlinked
Within one stem. And dreadfully distinct Against the dark, a tall white fountain played.

It was a night of thaw, a night of blow,
With great excitement in the air. Black spring
Stood just around the corner, shivering
In the wet starlight and on the wet ground.
The lake lay in the mist, it’s ice half drowned
A blurry shape stepped off the reedy bank
Into a cracking, gulping swamp, and sank

During one winter every afternoon.
I’d sink into that monetary swoon.
And then it ceased. Its memory grew dim.
My health improved. I even learned to swim.
But like some little lad forced by a wench.
With his pure tongue her abject thirst to quench,
I was corrupted, terrified, allured,
And though old doctor colt pronounced me cured
Of what, he said, we’re mainly growing pains,
Thewonderlingersandthesamrremains