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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 2,379 |
Halloween [two, three, and]
In HARlem [two, three, and]
HalloWEEN, [and] HalloWEEN, [and] in HARlem [two, three, four]
-- refrain of Sun Ra's (you guessed it) Halloween in Harlem.
(The count is counted, not spoken)
edited for ands
Last edited by inselpeter; 10/28/05 11:14 PM.
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veteran
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veteran
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It'll never happen - not until they pull my cold curled dead fingers away from the keyboard of my computer - a compilation of October poems with only one poem by Poe. Here is a great one...
_____The Conqueror Worm______
Lo! 'tis a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years!
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.
Mimes, in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
And hither and thither fly-
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their Condor wings
Invisible Woe!
That motley drama- oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased for evermore,
By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the self-same spot,
And much of Madness, and more of Sin,
And Horror the soul of the plot.
But see, amid the mimic rout
A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes!- it writhes!- with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
And seraphs sob at vermin fangs
In human gore imbued.
Out- out are the lights- out all!
And, over each quivering form,
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
While the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"
And its hero the Conqueror Worm.
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 4,189 |
A TALE OF THE THIRTEENTH FLOOR
by Ogden Nash
The hands of the clock were reaching high
In an old midtown hotel;
I name no name, but its sordid fame
Is table talk in hell.
I name no name, but hell's own flame
Illumes the lobby garish,
A gilded snare just off Times Square
For the maidens of the parish.
The revolving door swept the grimy floor
Like a crinoline grotesque,
And a lowly bum from an ancient slum
Crept furtively past the desk.
His footsteps sift into the lift
As a knife in the sheath is slipped,
Stealthy and swift into the lift
As a vampire into a crypt.
Old Maxie, the elevator boy,
Was reading an ode by Shelley,
But he dropped the ode as it were a toad
When the gun jammed into his belly.
There came a whisper as soft as mud
In the bed of an old canal:
"Take me up to the suite of Pinball Pete,
The rat who betrayed my gal."
The lift doth rise with groans and sighs
Like a duchess for the waltz,
Then in middle shaft, like a duchess daft,
It changes its mind and halts.
The bum bites lip as the landlocked ship
Doth neither fall nor rise,
But Maxie the elevator boy
Regards him with burning eyes.
"First, to explore the thirteenth floor,"
Says Maxie, "would be wise."
Quoth the bum, "There is moss on your double cross,
I have been this way before,
I have cased the joint at every point,
And there is no thirteenth floor.
The architect he skipped direct
From twelve unto fourteen,
There is twelve below and fourteen above,
And nothing in between,
For the vermin who dwell in this hotel
Could never abide thirteen."
Said Max, "Thirteen, that floor obscene,
Is hidden from human sight;
But once a year it doth appear,
On this Walpurgis Night.
Ere you peril your soul in murderer's role,
Heed those who sinned of yore;
The path they trod led away from God,
And onto the thirteenth floor,
Where those they slew, a grisly crew,
Reproach them forevermore.
"We are higher than twelve and below fourteen,"
Said Maxie to the bum,
"And the sickening draft that taints the shaft
Is a whiff of kingdom come.
The sickening draft that taints the shaft
Blows through the devil's door!"
And he squashed the latch like a fungus patch,
And revealed the thirteenth floor.
It was cheap cigars like lurid scars
That glowed in the rancid gloom,
The murk was a-boil with fusel oil
And the reek of stale perfume.
And round and round there dragged and wound
A loathsome conga chain,
The square and the hep in slow lock step,
The slayer and the slain.
(For the souls of the victims ascend on high,
But their bodies below remain.)
The clean souls fly to their home in the sky,
But their bodies remain below
To pursue the Cain who each has slain
And harry him to and fro.
When life is extinct each corpse is linked
To its gibbering murderer,
As a chicken is bound with wire around
The neck of a killer cur.
Handcuffed to Hate come Doctor Waite
(He tastes the poison now),
And Ruth and Judd and a head of blood
With horns upon its brow.
Up sashays Nan with her feathery fan
From Floradora bright;
She never hung for Caesar Young
But she's dancing with him tonight.
Here's the bulging hip and the foam-flecked lip
Of the mad dog, Vincent Coll,
And over there that ill-met pair,
Becker and Rosenthal,
Here's Legs and Dutch and a dozen such
Of braggart bullies and brutes,
And each one bends 'neath the weight of friends
Who are wearing concrete suits.
Now the damned make way for the double-damned
Who emerge with shuffling pace
From the nightmare zone of persons unknown,
With neither name nor face.
And poor Dot King to one doth cling,
Joined in a ghastly jig,
While Elwell doth jape at a goblin shape
And tickle it with his wig.
See Rothstein pass like breath on a glass,
The original Black Sox kid;
He riffles the pack, riding piggyback
On the killer whose name he hid.
And smeared like brine on a slavering swine,
Starr Faithful, once so fair,
Drawn from the sea to her debauchee,
With the salt sand in her hair.
And still they come, and from the bum
The icy sweat doth spray;
His white lips scream as in a dream,
"For God's sake, let's away!
If ever I meet with Pinball Pete
I will not seek his gore,
Lest a treadmill grim I must trudge with him
On the hideous thirteenth floor."
"For you I rejoice," said Maxie's voice,
"And I bid you go in peace,
But I am late for a dancing date
That nevermore will cease.
So remember, friend, as your way you wend,
That it would have happened to you,
But I turned the heat on Pinball Pete;
You see - I had a daughter, too!"
The bum reached out and he tried to shout,
But the door in his face was slammed,
And silent as stone he rode down alone
From the floor of the double-damned.
(c) 1952 by Ogden Nash
* Note: Walpurgis Night of German folklore is the eve of May 1st but this poem fits the "spirit" of Halloween as well.
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Posts: 7,210
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210 |
The leaves had a party one autumn day,
and invited the North Wind bold;
they put on their dresses of crimson and brown,
with their borders splashed with gold.
At first they danced to a merry tune,
but the North Wind whirled them round;
and tossed them roughly to and fro,
till they fell upon the ground.
And when kind old Dame Winter came,
she pitied the tired leaves so;
she laid them gently on the grass,
and covered them over with snow.
Alice C. D. Riley
formerly known as etaoin...
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addict
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addict
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I can't recall the title or author, but I memorized this one in public school and it's always stuck with me.
Indian Summer
William Wilfred Campbell
(thanks to Owlbow)
Along the line of smoky hills
The crimson forest stands,
And all the day the bluejay calls
Throughout the autumn lands.
Now by the brook the maple leans
With all his glory spread,
And all the sumacs on the hill
Have turned their green to red.
Now by great marshes wrapped in mist
Or past some river's mouth,
Throughout the long, clear autumn day
Wild birds are flying south.
And, if you'll forgive it, one I wrote.
Autumn Cat
The days grow shorter past the equinox;
The autumn hues of maple, pumpkin, frost
Peek through the fading leaves, and nights grow chill,
Though summer's warmth in daytime lingers still.
My cat's September too, who, day by day,
By changing shows me winter's on its way.
Her coat of black, all flecked with white and gold,
Grows thick and soft against the coming cold.
This huntress of fat mice on summer days
Looks nightwards now, and sets her golden gaze
On fluttermice who swiftly swoop in air,
By day stalks falling leaves as trees grow bare.
Though summer's warmth still lingers in her purr,
Night, frost and fox are lurking in her fur.
Last edited by Elizabeth Creith; 11/02/05 04:04 PM.
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addict
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Elizabeth, no need to ask forgiveness! I so envy people who can write poetry, and this is lovely. Don't hesitate to post more.
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Posts: 6,511
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 6,511 |
Winter is icumin in
Lhude sing Goddamn,
Raineth drop and staineth slop,
And how the wind doth ramm!
Sing; Goddamn.
Skiddeth bus and sloppeth us,
An ague hath my ham
Damn you, Sing, Goddamn.
Goddamn, Goddamn, 'tis why I am,
So 'gainst the winter's balm.
Sing goddamn, damn, sing goddamn,
Sing goddamn, sing goddamn, DAMM
-Ezra Pound (1915)
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Posts: 6,511
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 6,511 |
What a beautiful sonnet, Elizabeth! Thank you so much for posting it.
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Posts: 389
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Oct 2003
Posts: 389 |
Elizabeth, the poem is Indian Summer, by William Wilfred Campbell (1858?-1918). You original is wonderful too. I especially like the last line. Thanks for all these posted poems. (Yeah go ahead - something about "nailed it"...) Birches is among my favorites, in any season. It reminds me of swings of my own and of glad courting times with my wife (to be) in a grove of them. 
Last edited by Owlbow; 11/02/05 02:42 PM.
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Owlbow, thanks! I wouldn't have got that for the life of me. And AnnaS has posted another I like, although I think of that one more as a winter poem. (You people are all so nice about my poetry - shucks!)
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