Frankenstein

Adam

If life is but a ghastly dream, the child
of a great godly fever in the night,
then what will follow when the fit is over?
Oblivion. The rising of the sun.
If life is but a masquerade onstage,
the fancy of a nimble puppeteer,
then what’s to come after the play is acted?
Eternal stasis with the curtains drawn.
Men may conjecture—but what if they should find
that life is an insane experiment?
How would they justify their ways and wants
to the senseless instruments of chemistry?
No, let some other creature crack the code,
not me: I wash my hands of metaphysics.

Walton

Everything has already been written.
The silent islands of the deep Pacific,
the highest mountains and the sky itself,
the North and South Poles—all the hallowed secrets
that held my century in awe have been
discovered, taxonomically recorded,
and given names. What’s not been found has been
disproved: thus were Atlantis, God, the Trojans,
and the four humors scientifically
vanquished. I, captain of a ghostly crew,
stranded in ice since 1797,
have watched my fellow men pull back the veil
of Nature many times. But Death, who holds
the keys, still won’t unlock the final door.

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