Once upon a midnight dreary,
while I wandered, weak and weary,
past a queue of quaint and curious embassies along the road,
while I stumbled, nearly falling,
walking where the rails were walling
in ambassadors, whose calling give them prison-like abode,
then by fate an open gate all suddenly salvation showed.
I went in to rest my load.

Ah, distinctly I remember
it was in the bleak December -
rustling remnants of September whispered words of life gone by,
as in lamplight dimly burning
writing on the wall discerning
I could see: a place of learning was the mansion looming high,
towering with arcs and pillars up where swallows seldom fly.
I went in - don’t ask me why!

Was it learning I was seeking,
opening the door whose creaking
echoed back like muffled speaking from the large and lofty hall?
Or perhaps it was seclusion,
sanctuary from confusion,
refuge from the mind-pollution which infests us, one and all -
from distractions, deadlines, duties, driving wisdom up the wall?
Why would else the house enthrall?

Apprehensively ascending
carpet-covered steps extending
upwards, upwards, until ending on a nobly polished floor,
I could sense my slow advances
frowned upon by stony glances
darting out like moonlit lances from the marble heads of yore,
pallid profiles sternly guarding access to a heavy door.
I went in - could halt no more.

Vaguely for my senses fearing
I saw tapestries appearing:
sight and smell and taste and hearing - there were senses on the wall!
Senselessly I searched the ceiling:
Only four? And where was feeling -
sense of hurt, and sense of healing, sense most intimate of all?
See the world and smell its flowers, taste its fruit, hear children call -
lacking feeling, you will fall.

Could these four anaemic graces
with their calm, embroidered faces
really be all wisdom’s bases? Could so few support so much?
Can we really be achieving
understanding without leaving
all this cool, detached perceiving holding mind in method’s clutch,
and as parts of what we study recognise ourselves as such,
and engage our sense of touch?

“This is all too still and static!”
I exclaimed in tone emphatic,
when a squeaking from the attic made me catch my breath and leap.
All my courage quickly crumbling,
I could also hear a rumbling,
like obscure linguistic mumbling rising from the dungeon’s deep,
mingled with the wailing sound which infants utter when they weep.
Now my flesh was all acreep!

Through the panelled walls were seeping
groans from bodies slowly creeping
up a winding staircase, weeping, cursing it in tortured cries!
“Who,” I cried, the room resounding,
“who makes noises so confounding?
Is it spirits haunting, hounding shattered dreams with sobs and sighs?
Is it ghastly ghosts in torment, punished for their crimes and lies?”
Then a voice said: “Butterflies!”

Was the speaker transcendental?
No, he sounded more parental -
or perhaps, yes, governmental - ministerial, no doubt.
He was sitting at a table,
saying, “This is not a fable,
for whenever we are able we catch all that fly about,
studying them as they’re trying,” he concluded with a pout,
“desperately to get out.”

Shaking, I could hardly stutter:
“Why, oh why watch creatures flutter
by and hit the window shutter or be thrust against the door?”
He said, “Well, in all their bother
they may bump into each other!
With a sense of touch, my brother, serendipity will soar!
Mine is brilliant,” he said while leading me across the floor.
Shall I leave, ah, evermore?