Blog- An experiment in attempting to stir my muse this morning... - Robert Lindley's Blog

Going to try an experiment. I will now post a poem that was written by Edgar Allan Poe.
And then start to compose a tribute poem, with that poem in mind and the thoughts it inspired.
Point is to see how fast I can finish one that is by my standards good enough to pass muster. 

Poe's poem--one that is not dark....

To The River

by Edgar Allan Poe
(published 1829)



Fair river! in thy bright, clear flow
Of crystal, wandering water,
Thou art an emblem of the glow
Of beauty -- the unhidden heart --
The playful maziness of art
In old Alberto's daughter;

But when within thy wave she looks --
Which glistens then, and trembles --
Why, then, the prettiest of brooks
Her worshipper resembles;
For in my heart, as in thy stream,
Her image deeply lies --
The heart which trembles at the beam
Of her soul-searching eyes.

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My tribute offering,
Times started composing, 8:58am
finished 9:24am
This went far faster and came out far better than
i ever thought it could or would.--Tyr

O'Bright Star, Thy Bright Gleamings True Hearts See

O'bright star! may thy gleam our sad hearts sate
with splendor of glow, quench our dying thirsts
Thy exquisite beauty, mankind debates
as well, bold shining depths of thy starbursts.

Why gift that grin, that Chesire cat-eye glow.
As riddles we are never meant to know?

O'bright star! will thy eternal gaze blink
a galactic voice thy wisdom imparts
Are thy infinite gleamings - wine to drink,
as a soothing balm to heal broken hearts,
Shall ever thy distant voice our souls hear
or will we destroy Earth with hate and fear?

May we in our pitifully sad state.
Reach, touch thy heart's glow, to truly relate?

Robert J. Lindley, 9/10/2020
Sonnet, A tribute poem,
To Poe's, poem, titled,
"To The River"..

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edit- 9-12-2020 

https://www.chino.k12.ca.us/cms/lib/CA01902308/Centricity/Domain/3749/8.2.1_The%20Genius%20of%20Poe.pdf

The Genius of “The Tell-Tale Heart” BY STEPHEN KING

When I do public appearances, I’m often-no, always-asked what scares me. The answer is almost everything, from express elevators in very tall buildings to the idea of a zealot1 loose with a suitcase nuke in one of the great cities of the world. But if the question is refined to “What works of fiction have scared you?” two always leap immediately to mind: Lord of the Flies by William Golding and “The Tell-Tale Heart” by Edgar Allan Poe. Most people know that Poe invented the modern detective story (Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes is in many ways the same detective as Poe’s C. Auguste Dupin), but few are aware that he also created the first work of criminal sociopathy2 in “The Tell-Tale Heart,” a story originally published in 1843. Many great crime writers of the twentieth century, from Jim Thompson and John D. MacDonald to Thomas Harris (who in Hannibal Lecter may have created the greatest sociopath of them all), are the children of Poe. The details of the story are still gruesome enough to produce nightmares (the cutting up of the victim’s body, for instance, or the old man’s one dying shriek), but the terror that lingers-and the story’s genius-lies in the superficially reasonable voice of the narrator. He is never named, and that is fitting, because we have no idea how he picked his victim, or what drove him to the crime. Oh, we know what he says: it was the old man’s gruesomely veiled eye. But of course, Jeffrey Dahmer said he wanted to create zombies, and the Son of Sam at one point claimed his dog told him to do it. We understand, I think, that psychopaths3 offer such wacky motivations because they are as helpless as the rest of us to explain their terrible acts. This is, above all, a persuasive story of lunacy, and Poe never offers any real explanations. Nor has to. The narrator’s cheerful laughter (“A tub had caught… all [the blood]-ha! ha!”) tells us all we need to know. Here is a creature who looks like a man but who really belongs to another species. That’s scary. What elevates this story beyond merely scary and into the realm of genius, though, is that Poe foresaw the darkness of generations far beyond his own. Ours, for instance. 1: zealot- fanatic, enthusiast 2: sociopathy- having antisocial behavior 3: pychopaths- persons suffering from chronic mental disorder with abnormal or violent social behavior. B its founder, Thomas Jefferson. It had strict rules against gambling, horses, guns, tobacco and alcohol, but these rules were generally ignored. Jefferson had enacted a system of student self-government, allowing students to choose their own studies, make their own arrangements for boarding, and report all wrongdoing to the faculty. The unique system was still in chaos, and there was a high dropout rate. During his time there, Poe lost touch with Royster and also became estranged from his foster father over gambling debts. Poe claimed that Allan had not given him sufficient money to register for classes, purchase texts, and procure and furnish a dormitory. Allan did send additional money and clothes, but Poe's debts increased. Poe gave up on the university after a year, and, not feeling welcome in Richmond, especially when he learned that his sweetheart Royster had married Alexander Shelton, he traveled to Boston in April 1827, sustaining himself with odd jobs as a clerk and newspaper writer. At some point he started using the pseudonym Henri Le Rennet. Death On October 3, 1849, Poe was found on the streets of Baltimore delirious, "in great distress, and... in need of immediate assistance", according to the man who found him, Joseph W. Walker. He was taken to the Washington College Hospital, where he died on Sunday, October 7, 1849, at 5:00 in the morning. Poe was never coherent long enough to explain how he came to be in his dire condition, and, oddly, was wearing clothes that were not his own. Poe is said to have repeatedly called out the name "Reynolds" on the night before his death, though it is unclear to whom he was referring. Some sources say Poe's final words were "Lord help my poor soul." All medical records, including his death certificate, have been lost. Newspapers at the time reported Poe's death as "congestion of the brain" or "cerebral inflammation", common euphemisms for deaths from disreputable causes such as alcoholism. The actual cause of death remains a mystery; from as early as 1872, cooping was commonly believed to have been the cause, and speculation has included delirium tremens, heart disease, epilepsy, syphilis, meningeal inflammation, cholera and rabies. Griswold's "Memoir" The day Edgar Allan Poe was buried, a long obituary appeared in the New York Tribune signed "Ludwig". It was soon published throughout the country. The piece began, "Edgar Allan Poe is dead. He died in Baltimore the day before yesterday. This announcement will startle many, but few will be grieved by it." "Ludwig" was soon identified as Rufus Wilmot Griswold, an editor, critic and anthologist who had borne a grudge against Poe since 1842. Griswold somehow became Poe's literary executor and attempted to destroy his enemy's reputation after his death. Rufus Griswold wrote a biographical article of Poe called "Memoir of the Author", which he included in an 1850 volume of the collected works. Griswold depicted Poe as a depraved, drunk, drug-addled madman and included Poe's letters as evidence. Many of his claims were either lies or distorted half-truths. For example, it is now known that Poe was not a drug addict. Griswold's book was denounced by those who knew Poe well, but it became a popularly accepted one. This occurred in part because it was the only full biography available and was widely reprinted and in part because readers thrilled at the thought of reading works by an "evil" man. Letters that Griswold presented as proof of this depiction of Poe were later revealed as forgeries. Literary Style and Themes Genres Poe's best known fiction works are Gothic, a genre he followed to appease the public taste. His most recurring themes deal with questions of death, including its physical signs, the effects of decomposition, concerns of premature burial, the reanimation of the dead, and mourning. Many of his works are generally considered part of the dark romanticism genre, a literary reaction to transcendentalism, which Poe strongly disliked. He referred to followers of the movement as "Frogpondians" after the pond on Boston Common and ridiculed their writings as "metaphor-run mad," lapsing into "obscurity for obscurity's sake" or "mysticism for mysticism's sake." Poe once wrote in a letter to Thomas Holley Chivers that he did not dislike Transcendentalists, "only the pretenders and sophists among them." Beyond horror, Poe also wrote satires, humor tales, and hoaxes. For comic effect, he used irony and ludicrous extravagance, often in an attempt to liberate the reader from cultural conformity. In fact, "Metzengerstein", the first story that Poe is known to have published, and his first foray into horror, was originally intended as a burlesque satirizing the popular genre. Poe also reinvented science fiction, responding in his writing to emerging technologies such as hot air balloons in "The Balloon-Hoax". Poe wrote much of his work using themes specifically catered for mass market tastes. To that end, his fiction often included elements of popular pseudosciences such as phrenology and physiognomy.