'Oh sleep! it is a gentle thing, Beloved from pole to pole! To Mary Queen the praise be given! She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven, That slid into my soul. [Sidenote: By grace of the holy Mother, the ancient Mariner is refreshed with rain.] The silly buckets on the deck, That had so long remained, I dreamt that they were filled with dew; And when I awoke, it rained. My lips were wet, my throat was cold, My garments all were dank; Sure I had drunken in my dreams, 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. [Sidenote: He heareth sounds, and seeth strange sights and commotions in the sky and the element.] 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. The upper air burst into life, 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, 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: Like waters shot from some high crag, The lightning fell with never a jag, A river steep and wide. [Sidenote: The bodies of the ship's crew are inspirited, and the ship moves on;] The loud wind never reached the ship, Yet now the ship moved on! Beneath the lightning and the Moon The dead men gave a groan. They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose, Nor spake, nor moved their eyes; It had been strange, even in a dream, 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: 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, But he said nought to me.' [Sidenote: 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 invocation of the guardian saint.] 'I fear thee, Ancient Mariner!' 'Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest! 'Twas not those souls that fled in pain, Which to their corses came again, But a troop of spirits blest: 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. 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 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!