I.
Hear the sledges with the bells—
Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
II.
Hear the mellow wedding-bells—
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight!
From the molten-golden notes,
And all in tune,
What a liquid ditty floats
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon!
Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells!
How it dwells
On the Future!—how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!
III.
Hear the loud alarum bells—
Brazen bells!
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire—
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor,
Now—now to sit, or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating air!
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging
And the clanging,
How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling
And the wrangling,
How the danger sinks and swells,—
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells—
Of the bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells—
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!
IV.
Hear the tolling of the bells—
Iron bells!
What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone!
For every sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people—ah, the people—
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,
And who tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone—
They are neither man nor woman—
They are neither brute nor human—
They are Ghouls:—
And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,
Rolls
A pæan from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the pæan of the bells!
And he dances, and he yells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the pæan of the bells—
Of the bells:
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the throbbing of the bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells—
To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells—
To the tolling of the bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells—
Bells, bells, bells—
To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.
Originally published in 1849 by Edgar Allan Poe. Public domain.
Analysis
Poe’s “The Bells” is language as instrument: four movements in which diction, vowel color, and refrain enact a passage from delight to dread. The poem’s famous ‘tintinnabulation’ is not merely onomatopoeia; it is dramaturgy. Silver sleigh-bells “tinkle” in the crystalline air; nuptial gold swells into human fullness; brazen alarms rupture measure with jagged monosyllables; iron tolling presses a stone on the human heart. Across the arc, the poem exposes how communities encode emotion in sound—how bells choreograph public feeling from ceremony to catastrophe.
Structure and Sound
Each section designs its own acoustics. Part I features high vowels, quick trochaic lifts, and light liquids that mimic glittering cold. Part II opens the mouth with ‘o’ and ‘oo’ sounds, sustaining resonance like organ pipes in a chapel. Part III fractures meter into spasmodic syntax—enjambed yelps (“shriek, shriek”), clashing consonants (“clang,” “clash,” “roar”)—the stanza itself a fire alarm. Part IV slows to long ‘o’s and nasals, an adagio of rust and groan. Repetition is both musical and psychological: the reiterated ‘bells’ becomes a ritual incantation through which the poem moves from quantity (counting bells) to quality (embodying their effects).
Themes and Interpretation
Read as an allegory of the life-course, the poem passes from childhood’s silver wonder through marital gold, crisis, and death’s iron toll. But it also functions as a study in social acoustics: sound shapes crowds. Poe’s ghouls—sexless bell-ringers—figure faceless institutions of fate that “roll a stone” on human hearts, an image that inverts resurrection into oppression. The poem asks whether our most elevated ceremonies are merely rehearsals for loss, and whether language can modulate fear by giving it rhythm. In finally turning music into mortality, “The Bells” becomes an ars moriendi in four keys.