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  #1  
Unread 10-24-2014, 02:25 PM
Janice D. Soderling's Avatar
Janice D. Soderling Janice D. Soderling is offline
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Default Day of the Dead, All Hallows Eve, Halloween

We are approaching the day that is all of these days listed above. I remember a wonderful Halloween thread created by then-moderator Marion and illustrated by art moderator Sharon. Ah, those were the days.

I'm not on their creative level, but I can kickstart an opportunity to post poems about any and all of the above ways to celebrate--from the hallowed to the gruesome.

Remember, it isn't the done thing to post one's own poems, but you can toot your buddy's horn; this time of year a foghorn might be most appropriate--at least in the hemisphere where I live. Not so for those down under, but they might wish to celebrate the resurrection of spring etc. and that's fine too.

I'll start it off with one of the finest poems on death that I know. It is a faux terza rima by Robert Pack.

The Boat

I dressed my father in his little clothes,
Blue sailor suit, brass buttons on his coat.
He asked me where the running water goes.

"Down to the sea," I said; "Set it afloat!"
Beside the stream he bent and raised the sail,
Uncurled the string and launched the painted boat.

White birds, circling the mast, wrenched his eyes pale.
He leaped on the tight deck and took the wind.
I watched the ship foam lurching in the gale,

And cried, "Come back, you don't know what you'll find!"
He steered. The ship grew, reddening the sky
As waves throbbed back, blind stumbling after blind.

The storm receded in his darkened eyes,
And down he looked at me. A harbor rose.
I asked, "What happens, father, when you die?

He told where all the running water goes,
And dressed me gently in my little clothes.
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  #2  
Unread 10-24-2014, 05:28 PM
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RCL RCL is offline
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Luke Havergal

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal,
There where the vines cling crimson on the wall,
And in the twilight wait for what will come.
The leaves will whisper there of her, and some,
Like flying words, will strike you as they fall;
But go, and if you listen she will call.
Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal--
Luke Havergal.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies
To rift the fiery night that's in your eyes;
But there, where western glooms are gathering,
The dark will end the dark, if anything:
God slays Himself with every leaf that flies,
And hell is more than half of paradise.
No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies--
In eastern skies.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this,
Out of a grave I come to quench the kiss
That flames upon your forehead with a glow
That blinds you to the way that you must go.
Yes, there is yet one way to where she is,
Bitter, but one that faith may never miss.
Out of a grave I come to tell you this--
To tell you this.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal,
There are the crimson leaves upon the wall.
Go, for the winds are tearing them away,--
Nor think to riddle the dead words they say,
Nor any more to feel them as they fall;
But go, and if you trust her she will call.
There is the western gate, Luke Havergal--
Luke Havergal.

E A Robinson
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  #3  
Unread 10-24-2014, 06:51 PM
Julie Steiner Julie Steiner is offline
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The scariest poem I know.

And here's a funny one to calm you after that.
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  #4  
Unread 10-25-2014, 01:49 AM
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Ann Drysdale Ann Drysdale is offline
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And a British perspective:


COLONEL FAZACKERLEY BUTTERWORTH-TOAST
by Charles Causley

Colonel Fazackerley Butterworth-Toast
Bought an old castle complete with a ghost,
But someone or other forgot to declare
To Colonel Fazak that the spectre was there.

On the very first evening, while waiting to dine,
The Colonel was taking a fine sherry wine,
When the ghost, with a furious flash and a flare,
Shot out of the chimney and shivered, 'Beware!'

Colonel Fazackerley put down his glass
And said, 'My dear fellow, that's really first class!
I just can't conceive how you do it at all.
I imagine you're going to a Fancy Dress Ball?'

At this, the dread ghost made a withering cry.
Said the Colonel (his monocle firm in his eye),
'Now just how you do it, I wish I could think.
Do sit down and tell me, and please have a drink.'

The ghost in his phosphorous cloak gave a roar
And floated about between ceiling and floor.
He walked through a wall and returned through a pane
And backed up the chimney and came down again.

Said the Colonel, 'With laughter I'm feeling quite weak!'
(As trickles of merriment ran down his cheek).
'My house-warming party I hope you won't spurn.
You MUST say you'll come and you'll give us a turn!'

At this, the poor spectre - quite out of his wits -
Proceeded to shake himself almost to bits.
He rattled his chains and he clattered his bones
And he filled the whole castle with mumbles and moans.

But Colonel Fazackerley, just as before,
Was simply delighted and called out, 'Encore!'
At which the ghost vanished, his efforts in vain,
And never was seen at the castle again.

'Oh dear, what a pity!' said Colonel Fazak.
'I don't know his name, so I can't call him back.'
And then with a smile that was hard to define,
Colonel Fazackerley went in to dine
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  #5  
Unread 10-27-2014, 11:59 AM
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Maryann Corbett Maryann Corbett is offline
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I'm sure this isn't new to readers here, but it never hurts to be seasonably reminded: "The Listeners," by Walter de la Mare.
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  #6  
Unread 10-27-2014, 12:49 PM
Jeanne G Jeanne G is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Julie Stoner View Post
And here's a funny one to calm you after that.
The Wendigo,
The Wendigo!
I saw it just a friend ago!
Last night it lurked in Canada;
Tonight, on your veranada!


Oh my. My "smoking room" will never be the same again!
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  #7  
Unread 10-28-2014, 10:53 AM
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John Whitworth John Whitworth is offline
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WHEN THE NIGHT WIND HOWLS
by: W.S. Gilbert (1836-1911)


WHEN the night wind howls
In the chimney cowls,
And the bat in the moonlight flies,
And the inky clouds,
Like funeral shrouds,
Sail over the midnight skies--
When the footpads quail
At the night-bird’s wail,
And black dogs bay at the moon,
Then is the spectre’s holiday--
Then is the ghost’s high noon! Ha! Ha!
Then is the ghost’s high noon!

As the sob of the breeze
Sweeps over the trees
And the mists lie low on the fen,
From grey tomb-stones
Are gathered the bones
That once were women and men,
And away they go,
With a mop and a mow,
To the revel that ends too soon,
For cock crow limits our holiday--
The dead of the night’s high noon! Ha! Ha!
The dead of the night’s high noon!

And then each ghost
With his lade-toast
To their church yard beds take flight,
With a kiss, perhaps,
On her lantern chaps,
And a grisly grim, “good night!”
Till the welcome knell
Of the midnight bell
Rings forth its jolliest tune,
And ushers in our next high holiday--
The dead of the night’s high noon! Ha! Ha!
The dead of the night’s high noon!
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  #8  
Unread 10-28-2014, 03:00 PM
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Gail White Gail White is offline
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Scariest poem I ever read was Robert Frost's "The Witch of Cos", too long to include here. But John's post reminds me that in this context we should not forget the immortal Thomas Lovell Beddoes.

THE PHANTOM WOOER

A ghost, that loved a lady fair,
Ever in the starry air
Of midnight at her pillow stood
And with a sweetness skies above
The luring words of human love,
Her soul the phantom wooed.
Sweet and sweet is their poisoned note,
The little snakes of silver throat,
In mossy skull that nest and lie,
Ever singing, "Die, oh! die."

Young soul, put off your flesh and come
With me into the quiet tomb.
Our bed is lovely, dark, and sweet;
The earth will swing us, as she goes,
Beneath our coverlid of snows,
And the warm leaden sheet.
Dear and dear is their poisoned note,
The little snakes of silver throat,
In mossy skulls that nest and lie,
Ever singing, "Die, oh! die."
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  #9  
Unread 10-28-2014, 04:34 PM
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Janice D. Soderling Janice D. Soderling is offline
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Only Death,
- Pablo Neruda

There are cemeteries that are lonely,
graves full of bones that do not make a sound,
the heart moving through a tunnel,
in it darkness, darkness, darkness,
like a shipwreck we die going into ourselves,
as though we were drowning inside our hearts,
as though we lived falling out of the skin into the soul.

And there are corpses,
feet made of cold and sticky clay,
death is inside the bones,
like a barking where there are no dogs,
coming out from bells somewhere, from graves somewhere,
growing in the damp air like tears of rain.

Sometimes I see alone
coffins under sail,
embarking with the pale dead, with women that have dead hair,
with bakers who are as white as angels,
and pensive young girls married to notary publics,
caskets sailing up the vertical river of the dead,
the river of dark purple,
moving upstream with sails filled out by the sound of death,
filled by the sound of death which is silence.

Death arrives among all that sound
like a shoe with no foot in it, like a suit with no man in it,
comes and knocks, using a ring with no stone in it, with no
finger in it,
comes and shouts with no mouth, with no tongue, with no
throat.
Nevertheless its steps can be heard
and its clothing makes a hushed sound, like a tree.

I’m not sure, I understand only a little, I can hardly see,
but it seems to me that its singing has the color of damp violets,
of violets that are at home in the earth,
because the face of death is green,
and the look death gives is green,
with the penetrating dampness of a violet leaf
and the somber color of embittered winter.

But death also goes through the world dressed as a broom,
lapping the floor, looking for dead bodies,
death is inside the broom,
the broom is the tongue of death looking for corpses,
it is the needle of death looking for thread.

Death is inside the folding cots:
it spends its life sleeping on the slow mattresses,
in the black blankets, and suddenly breathes out:
it blows out a mournful sound that swells the sheets,
and the beds go sailing toward a port
where death is waiting, dressed like an admiral.
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  #10  
Unread 10-28-2014, 08:10 PM
Roger Slater Roger Slater is offline
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Haunted Houses
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

All houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sound upon the floors.

We meet them at the door-way, on the stair,
Along the passages they come and go,
Impalpable impressions on the air,
A sense of something moving to and fro.

There are more guests at table than the hosts
Invited; the illuminated hall
Is thronged with quiet, inoffensive ghosts,
As silent as the pictures on the wall.

The stranger at my fireside cannot see
The forms I see, nor hear the sounds I hear;
He but perceives what is; while unto me
All that has been is visible and clear.

We have no title-deeds to house or lands;
Owners and occupants of earlier dates
From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands,
And hold in mortmain still their old estates.

The spirit-world around this world of sense
Floats like an atmosphere, and everywhere
Wafts through these earthly mists and vapours dense
A vital breath of more ethereal air.

Our little lives are kept in equipoise
By opposite attractions and desires;
The struggle of the instinct that enjoys,
And the more noble instinct that aspires.

These perturbations, this perpetual jar
Of earthly wants and aspirations high,
Come from the influence of an unseen star
An undiscovered planet in our sky.

And as the moon from some dark gate of cloud
Throws o’er the sea a floating bridge of light,
Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd
Into the realm of mystery and night,—

So from the world of spirits there descends
A bridge of light, connecting it with this,
O’er whose unsteady floor, that sways and bends,
Wander our thoughts above the dark abyss.
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