Comments

  1. Tethys says

    Ah, distinctly I remember,
    it was in the bleak December.
    And each separate dying ember,
    wrought its ghost upon the floor.

  2. rblackadar says

    For me this poem evokes Emily Dickinson 479 — the meter, the 4-line stanzas, and the first sentence in particular. Something of an homage (with anchovies) I shouldn’t doubt.

  3. Tethys says

    I see a lot in common between Poe’s verse, this poem, and some of the oldest examples of verse in the Norse/Anglo Saxon body of literature.

    Alliteration on the first two lines, onomatopoeia, the syncopation etc…

    I can think of an example that isn’t about death, though it’s true that most of these old storylines are ultimately about death too.

    Under the tree, dwell maidens three
    At the well within the wood.
    Will be the first, Becoming another
    The third one is called Should.

    ~Voluspa

    Of course, the next verse describes how they carve into the roots of the tree, and set the fates of all men, so I guess it is about death.

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