To Miss Alice Williams of Pine Ridge [?], Mass.
"The Bells" (circa 1848)
Poem by Edgar Allan Poe, 1809-1849
Music by Franz Petersilea

Boston: George P. Reed
[Source: 065/003@Levy]

Hear the sledges with the bells— silver bells! 
What a world of merriment their melody foretells! 
How they tinkle, tinkly, tinkle, 
In the icy air of night, 
While the stars that over sprinkle 
All the heavens seem to twinkle 
With a chrystaline delight, keeping time, time, time, 
In a sort of runic rhyme 
To the tintinabulation that so musically wells 
From the bells, bells, bells bells, bells, bells, bells, 
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells! 
Hear the mellow wedding bells, Golden bells! 
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells! 
Through the balmy air of night 
How they ring out their delight! 
From the molten golden notes and all in tune 
What a liquid ditty floats! 
To the turtle dove that listens 
While she gloats on the moon; 
Oh from out the sounding cells 
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells! 
How it swells! How it dewlls 
On the Future! how it tells 
Of the rapture that impells 
To the swinging and the ringing 
Of the golden wedding bells! 
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, 
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells. 
Hear the loud alarum bells! Brazen bells! 
What a tale of terror now their turbulency tells. 
In the startled ear of night 
How they scream out their affright; 
Too much horrified to speak 
They can only shriek 
Out of tune In a clamorous appealing 
To the mercy of the fire, 
In a mad expostulation 
To the deaf and frantic fire, 
Leaping higher higher higher 
With a desperate dedire 
And a resolute endeavour 
Now near to sit or never by the palefaced moon, 
Oh the bells, bells, bells, 
What a tale their teror tells Of despair! 
How they clang and clash and roar. 
What a horror they outpour 
On the palpitating air! 
Yet the ear it fully know 
By the twanging and the clanging 
How the danger ebbs and flows; 
Yet the ear distinctly tells 
In the jangling and the wrangling 
How the danger sinks and wells 
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells! 
Hear the tolling of the bells, Iron bells! 
What a world of solemn thought their monody compells. 
In the silence of the night 
How we shiver with affright 
At the melancholy menace 
Of their tone; 
For ev’ry sound that floats 
From the rust within their throats in a groan. 
And the people, Ah the people! 
They shall dwell up in the steeple 
All alone! 
And who tolling, tolling, tolling 
In that mufled monotone 
Feel a glory in so rolling 
On the human heart a stone. 
They are neither man nor woman. 
They are neither brute nor human, 
They are Ghoals! 
And their king it is who rolls. 
And the rolls, rolls, rolls, 
A paean from the bells; 
And his merry bosom swells 
With the paean of the bells; 
And he dances and he yells, 
Keeping time, time, time, 
In a sort of Runic rhyme 
To the throbbing of the bells, 
To the sobbing of the bells, 
To the rolling of the bells, 
To the tolling of the bells! 
Of the bells! 
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells!