"Kubla Khan: or A Vision in a Dream" (/ˈkuːblə ˈkɑːn/) is a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, completed in 1797 and published in 1816. It is sometimes given the subtitles "A Vision in a Dream" and "A Fragment." According to Coleridge's preface to "Kubla Khan", the poem was composed one night after he experienced an opium-influenced dream after reading a work describing Xanadu, the summer capital of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty of China founded by Kublai Khan (Emperor Shizu of Yuan). Upon waking, he set about writing lines of poetry that came to him from the dream until he was interrupted by "a person on business from Porlock". The poem could not be completed according to its original 200–300 line plan as the interruption caused him to forget the lines. He left it unpublished and kept it for private readings for his friends until 1816 when, at the prompting of Lord Byron, it was published.
The poem is vastly different in style from other poems written by Coleridge. The first stanza of the poem describes Kublai Khan's pleasure dome built alongside a sacred river fed by a powerful fountain. The second stanza depicts the sacred river as a darker, supernatural and more violent force of nature. Ultimately the clamor and energy of the physical world breaks through into Kublai's inner turmoil and restlessness. The third and final stanza of the poem is the narrator's response to the power and effects of an Abyssinian maid's song, which enraptures him but leaves him unable to act on her inspiration unless he could hear her once again. Together, the stanzas form a comparison of creative power that does not work with nature and creative power that is harmonious with nature. Coleridge concludes by describing a hypothetical audience's reaction to the song in the language of religious ecstasy.
