All Hallow's Eve: A Tribute to 3 Creepy Poems

Before my blogging days, I was a literature major at UCLA. (which is probably why my blogs are generally a bit more verbose than typical blogs in today's short-attention-span society). and even though i love technology, there's still something that i adore about putting pen to fine paper...or a napkin...and that is usually where the art of my writing always begins. it keeps me connected to my craft.

Edgar Allan Poe

i was IMing with a dear friend this morning and somehow we got to talking about Edgar Allan Poe, one of my all time fave poets, and i realized it's Halloween! so i started free-associating with some other wonderful, tragic poems, and decided that they deserved a shout out on All Hallow's Eve. (which, for those of you who are Gone with the Wind fans, might remember that in Scarlett, the sequel, Scarlett O'Hara gives birth to her daughter in Ireland by a gruesome c-section by a local witch on All Hallow's Eve. or so i remember it. someone fact check me? it's a good story, anyway...) 

anywhoo, without further ado, Happy Halloween and enjoy some of my favorite old poems that will hopefully put you in the mood...for some soul-torturing rhymes. I've included excerpts but you can click the title of each poem for the full versions. Enjoy!

Alfred Noyes, The Highwayman

in which the Highwayman, in an eternal tribute to his dead, forbidden love, the inn-keepers daughter, rides the highway

"...and still of a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,

when the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,

when the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,

a highway man comes riding--

      -riding-----riding----

a highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door..."

Edgar Allan Poe, Annabel Lee

in which the great, dark poet laments this about his undying love:

"...and neither the angels in heaven above,
nor the demons down under the sea,
can ever dissever my soul from the soul 
of the beautiful Annabel Lee..."

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Tithonus:

one of my very favorite, all time poets wrote this little diddy in which a man asks the gods to give him immortal life, but forgets to ask for immortal youth, and just grows older and more withered while watching Aurora, the goddess of the sunrise, renewing the day and all life every morning:

"...let me go: take back thy gift:
why should man desire in any way
to vary from the kindly race of men,
or pass beyond the goal of ordinance
Where all should pause, as is most meet for all?..."