Tell me what thy lordly name is, is or was, in days of yore.”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore!”
Much I marvelled this most sickly fowl to hear respond so quickly,
Though the nomen was a rum one, it a certain aptness bore,
As to those dull dupes of folly and foreboding melancholy,
Hopeful seldom, never jolly, doting on those days of yore,—
Who esteem the present hopeless, utter failure or next door—
To be mended nevermore!
But the Raven, squatting lonely on the plaster bust spoke only
That one word, as though his soul in doldrums he would thus outpour.