“‘I was a child, and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
And we loved with a love that was more than love,
I and my Annabel Lee--
A love that the wingèd seraphs in heaven
Coveted her and me.’
The first line might stand,” said I, “for you are only fourteen, and
I but one-and-twenty--which is quite young youth when compared to
the age of the earth. But the third and fourth lines are appalling.
And, alas, you are not my Annabel Lee. Always you make me feel,
indeed, that nothing is mine. And no, surely the winged seraphs in
heaven do not envy you and me for anything.”
“If they do,” said my friend Annabel Lee, “then heaven must needs
be very poorly furnished.”