Nightmare

As though a thousand vampires, from the day Fleeing unseen, oppressed that nightly deep, The straitening and darkened skies of sleep Closed on the dreamland dale in which I lay. Eternal tensions numbed the wings of time While through unending narrow ways I sought Awakening; up precipitous gloom I thought To reach the dawn, far-pinnacled sublime. Rejected at the closen gates of light I turned, and down new dreams and shadows fled, Where beetling shapes of veiled, colossal dread With Gothic wings enormous arched the night.