Annabel Lee leaned her two elbows on the back of a tiny sandalwood
chair and looked down at me.
We regarded each other coldly, as friends do, times.
“You,” said Annabel Lee, “have a half-conscious soul. Such a soul
that when it hears a strain of music can hear away to the music’s
depths but can understand only one-half of its meaning; but because
it is half-conscious it knows that it understands only the half,
and must need weep for the other half; such a soul that when it
wanders into the deep green and meets there a shadow-woman, with
long, dark hair and an enchanting voice, it feels to its depths
the spirit of the green and the voice of the shadow-woman, but
can understand only one-half of what they tell: but because it is
half-conscious it knows that it understands only the half, and must
need weep for the other half; such a soul that when it is bound and
fettered heavily, it knows since it is half-conscious, that it is
bound and fettered, but knows not why nor wherefore nor whether it
is well, which is the other half--and it must need weep for it; such
a soul that when it hears thunderings in the wild sky will awaken
from sleep and listen--listen, but since it is half-conscious it
can only hear, not know--and it sounds like an unknown voice in an
unknown language, telling the dying speech of its best-loved--it is
frantic to know the translation which is the other half; such a soul
that when life gathers itself up from around it and stands before
it and says, Now, contemplate life, it contemplates, since it is
half-conscious, but it for that same reason strains its eyes to
look over life’s shoulders into the dimness--which is an impossible
thing, and the other half; such a soul that when it finds itself
mingling in love for its friend, and all, it enjoys, oh, vividly
in all moments but the crucial moments, when it aches in torment
and doubt--for it is half-conscious and so knows its lacking.
“Desolate is the way of the half-conscious soul,” said Annabel Lee.
“The wholly conscious soul receives into itself things in their
entirety without question or wonder: the half-conscious soul receives
the half of things, and knowing that there is another half, it
wonders and questions till all’s black.
“The wholly conscious soul is different from the wholly unconscious
soul in that the former is positive whilst the latter is negative--and
they both in their nature can find rest: but the half-conscious
soul knows that it is half-conscious, still it knows not at what
points it is conscious and at what points unconscious--for when it
thinks itself conscious, lo, it is unconscious, and when it thinks
itself unconscious it is heavily, bitterly conscious--and nowhere
can it find rest.
“The wholly conscious soul holds up before its eyes a mirror and
gazes at itself, its color, its texture, its quality, its desires
and motives, without flinching, in the strong light of day; the
wholly unconscious soul knows not that it is a soul, and never uses
a mirror: but the half-conscious soul looks into its glass in the
gray light of dusk--it sees its color, its texture, its quality,
its desires--but its motives are hidden. Its eyes are wide in the
gray light to learn what those, its own motives, are. It can not
know, but it can never rest for trying to know.
“The wholly conscious soul knows its love, its sorrow, its
bitterness, its remorse.
“The half-conscious soul knows its love--and wonders why it loves,
and wonders if it really can love any but itself, and wonders that
it cares for love; the half-conscious soul knows its sorrow--and
marvels that it should have sorrow since it can grasp not truth;
the half-conscious soul knows its bitterness, and realizes at once
its right to and its reason for bitterness--but, thinking of it,
the arrow is turned in the wound; the half-conscious soul knows
its remorse, but it is convinced that it has no right to remorse,
since it does its unworthy acts with infinite forethought.
“The wholly conscious soul is a chastened spirit and so has its
measure of happiness; the wholly unconscious soul is an unchastened
spirit, for it deserves no chastisement--neither has it any
happiness, for it knows not whether it is happy or otherwise: but
the half-conscious soul is chastised where it is not deserving of
it, and goes unchastised where it is richly deserving of it--and
so has no happiness, but instead, unhappiness.
“Woe to the half-conscious soul,” said Annabel Lee.
“How brilliantly does the emerald sea flash in the sunshine before
the eyes of the half-conscious soul!--but burns it with mad-fire.
“How melting-sweet is the perfume of the blue anemone to the sense
of the half-conscious soul!--but burns it with mad-fire.
“How beautiful are the bronze lights in the eyes of its friend to
the half-conscious soul!--that burn it with mad-fire.
“How joyous is the half-conscious soul at the sounds of singing
voices on water!--that burn it with mad-fire.
“How surely come the wild, sweet meanings of the outer air into the
depths of the half-conscious soul!--but burn it with mad-fire.
“How madly happy is the half-conscious soul in still hours at sight
of a solitary pine-tree upon the mountain-top!--that burns it with
mad-fire.
“How tenderly comes Truth to the half-conscious soul in the dead
watches of the night!--but burns it with mad-fire.
“Life is vivid, alert, telling to the half-conscious soul,” said
Annabel Lee.
“You,” said Annabel Lee, “with your half-conscious soul, when you
sit where the gray waves wash the sea-wall at high-tide, when you
sit listening with your head bent and your hands dead cold, you
think you realize your life--you think you know its hardness--you
think you have measured the cruelty they will give you; but you do
not know. You know but half--you weep for the other half, though
it be horror.
“Still, though you are but half-conscious, though you weep for the
other half, when you sit listening with your head bent and your hands
dead cold, where the gray waves wash the sea-wall at high-tide--yet
you know some of each one of the things that are around you.
“Wonderful in conception is the half-conscious soul,” said Annabel
Lee.----
I looked hard at my friend Annabel Lee. Was she teasing me? Was
she laughing at me? For she does tease me and she does laugh at
me. And was she at either of these pastimes, with all this about
a half-conscious soul?
But here again she left me ignorant of her thought, and there is
no way of knowing.