Nathicana

"Nathicana" is a narrative poem by H. P. Lovecraft, first published in 1927 in The Vagrant. It has been included in some Lovecraft collections, such as The Doom that Came to Sarnath (1971).
The poem shares themes in common with Lovecraft's Dreamlands cycle.
==Synopsis==
The narrative is set in the pale, mist-covered gardens of Zaïs: a place of beauty and tranquility, with white nephalotë flowers, crystalline lakes and silent streamlets running under alabaster bridges. The sky is filled with alien suns and planets, as well as "the crescent Banapis". At night, "the white vapours of Yabon" fall over the landscape.
One night, the narrator meets and falls in love with a mysterious woman, the titular Nathicana. The two spend time together in the gardens and "dream in a world made of dreaming". They live happily until the arrival of the dreaded "season of Dzannin", in which the suns and planets shine red, as do the crescent Banapis and the vapours of Yabon, reddening in turn the flowers, lakes and streamlets, and making even the alabaster bridges seem pink.
The narrator searches for their beloved through the ubiquitous red mist, but seems to find themself in a new world: "a horrible coma call'd living", inhabited by bright hollow "phantoms of beauty". The phantoms, although superficially beautiful like Nathicana, are entirely evil. It is only in dreams now that the narrator is able to find Nathicana.
As the poem ends, the narrator is brewing a deadly potion, hoping that suicide will free them and allow them to return to the white gardens of Zaïs where "the deathless, restor'd Nathicana" awaits them.
Category:Lovecraft Circle Works
Category:H. P. Lovecraft works