Here is my attempt at reading a favorite poem of mine, “The Raven” By Edgar Allan Poe. The Boston weather did not agree with me. I hope to redo this next year with more agreeable weather. I also hope I did some fans of Poe honor.
Before the video, a little about why I wanted to do this. “The Raven” was one of Poe’s instant successes, but do a deep dive into his life, you find a soul tortured by abandonment and death. An orphan who struggled with addictions (financial and illicit), he found himself the mysterious and the macabre. He made what little he had from writing. Starving artist doesn’t even capture it. Poe was a critical mind, who slaved over every line of his works, rewriting them, and rewriting them to ink the most gothic wording out of every line. You can hear the melody in “The Raven”. It’s like a siren calling you to crash to the shore.
So to all Black, Brown, or Starving writers, we are in good company. Shout out to my wife and “sister-wife” for their technical assistance.
This Halloween of #31dayofhorror, read “The Raven” to yourself and to little trick-or-treaters in your life. Hear the narrator’s terror as he is stocked by ghosts and memories in the form of a Raven.
Stay Ghoulish.