Since it is Halloween, here is some eerie poetry for your perusal.
This one is by Robert Frost titled "The Witch of Coos":
http://www.bartleby.com/300/2462.html
One detects a touch of tongue-in-cheek here; the mother and son maybe having a little fun at the guest's expense. I read a footnote somewhere that there was a French Canadian connection, "Toffil Lajway" probably actually being "Theofil La Joie".
This next one is by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "The Mother's Ghost", in which a deceased wife puts the richly deserved fear of God into her husband for neglect of the children:
http://www.hwlongfellow.org/poems_poem.php?pid=2091
This one was in an American Literature anthology when I was in high school, entitled "Old Christmas Morning", referring to the date Christmas was celebrated on the Julian calendar. My adolescent self found it intriguingly creepy:
https://allpoetry.com/Old-Christmas-Morning
A cautionary tale about blood feuds.
Well! That "Old Christmas Morning" is great! Didn't see that coming at all!
ReplyDeleteI don't know much about the poet, Roy Helton. The only thing I could find was a short wiki article that listed some out of print works and said he used to write for The Atlantic. One of those tantalizingly obscure writers.
DeleteNice ones. I don't know if there's such a thing as holloween art, but this painting by Jamie Wyeth has always seemed creepy ... Pumpkinhead - self portrait
ReplyDeleteYikes!
DeleteJean, He's smiling. I think.
DeleteKinda looks like me after I've had a few.
ReplyDeleteDid you guys see that Jim Mc is ok?
ReplyDeleteYes, sounds like he was traveling.
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