The Drunkard's Dream

Where am I?—where? and wherefore am I here? 
Is this a pillow for my aching head?
And this a couch? Ah, cruel curb-stone!—no!
No, gutter! ‘Tis a stone, and a foul ditch,
Nor bed, nor pillow. Now I feel—I see—
This is a ditch — a hard, unfeeling ditch—
And this my pillow is a very stone;
Alas! my head—it had a love for it,
But ‘twas hard-hearted, and these weary bones 
Bid me confess in truth, though I am down, 
My bed is not. I am awake, I think—
And this, if I misjudge not, is a post;
Yes, bloody knuckle, I am wide awake, 
And 'tis a post. Well, heaven be thanked for that!
For I have had a dream—a wondrous dream:
Ye powers of gin! it was a horrid one.
Come, Memory, come—and wake the vision up, 
With all its wild and strange variety:
And thou, oh tongue, speak it, and scare the world.
I slept—ah! did I? Did I not? I dreamed, 
And if I dream not now, then did I sleep.
Methought I saw a gathering cloud come up, 
Dark and portentous, on the brow of heaven—
Bending in gloom above the summer plains;
And when the earth looked up, and would have blessed
The coming showers, the dark clouds burst in twain,
And it rained RUM! Down, down the torrents poured,
Floods upon floods, unto the thirsty earth;
The withered corn fell blasted at its touch—
The broad, bright fields of rich and waving grain,
That in the wind seemed rolling like a sea 
Were shrunk and desolate: Forests lost their hue— 
And the green grass grew yellow, drooped and died.
The lowing herds came thirsty to the springs, 
Snuffed ap the air, and pawed the grassless sod, 
And in wild fight ran bellowing o’er the plains
The fleecy flocks, that drink the morning dew, 
The beaded nectar on the herbage sought, 
Glad if amid the withered waste, they found 
One cooling drop—but all was changed to rum!
Insect, and beast, and bird, refused to taste, 
And went athirst. Green tree, and herb, and flower,
Drooped verdureless beneath the fiery rain:
And Nature groaned, as if her conscious fields 
Had felt the violence of a mighty curse.
But there was one amid the living tribes,—
Of God created king—pre-eminent 
In form and glory over all the rest, 
Who leaped exulting as the clouds pouted down
The unusual torrents—and his name was MAN.
Where e'er a roof shed down the falling shower—
Where e'er a fountain poured its bubbling tide—
By river, bay, broad lake, and ocean strand, 
He rushed and drank, till man on man up-piled 
Choked all the passes; and the hosts unfilled 
Ran to and fro, with lips upturned, to catch 
The unmingled tide, pure falling from the skies.
They quaffed, and all went reeling on their way,
Jostling together, till at last, o'erpowered, 
They fell to earth, and all the world was drunk!
Still poured the floods, down-leaping to the earth,
And the dry earth received them. I, alone 
Of all my race, drank not. I stood and saw 
Hosts reel around me, and the bounding floods 
Roll down the chambers of the firmament, 
Till the Earth staggered—for even Earth grew drunk—
And reeling strangely through the affrighted orbs
Of sister planets, that shrunk back aghast, 
She fell, and dashed against the solid Moon!
The shock awoke me from my horrid dream;
But ah! I fear I broke my bloody bead, 
On the confounded curb-stone, when she struck.