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A Ballad: The Lake of the Dismal Swamp
By Thomas Moore
“They made her a grave, too cold and damp
For a soul so warm and true;
And she’s gone to the Lake of the Dismal Swamp,
Where, all night long, by a fire-fly lamp,
She paddles her white canoe.
The whole ballad is here
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
at this site by Becca Klaver with poems and other interesting articles:
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
A few of the poems:
“Djinn” by Rae Armantrout
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
“To the Dead in the Graveyard Underneath My Window” by Adelaide Crapsey
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
“Samhain” by Annie Finch
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
“All Hallows” by Louise Glück
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
“To -- -- --. Ulalume: A Ballad” by Edgar Allan Poe
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
“Her Kind” by Anne Sexton
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
More Halloween poems:
Ghost House
by Robert Frost
I dwell in a lonely house I know
That vanished many a summer ago,
And left no trace but the cellar walls,
And a cellar in which the daylight falls,
And the purple-stemmed wild raspberries grow.
O'er ruined fences the grape-vines shield
The woods come back to the mowing field;
The orchard tree has grown one copse
Of new wood and old where the woodpecker chops;
The footpath down to the well is healed.
I dwell with a strangely aching heart
In that vanished abode there far apart
On that disused and forgotten road
That has no dust-bath now for the toad.
Night comes; the black bats tumble and dart;
The whippoorwill is coming to shout
And hush and cluck and flutter about:
I hear him begin far enough away
Full many a time to say his say
Before he arrives to say it out.
It is under the small, dim, summer star.
I know not who these mute folk are
Who share the unlit place with me—
Those stones out under the low-limbed tree
Doubtless bear names that the mosses mar.
They are tireless folk, but slow and sad,
Though two, close-keeping, are lass and lad,--
With none among them that ever sings,
And yet, in view of how many things,
As sweet companions as might be had.
Overheard on a Saltmarsh
by Harold Munro
Nymph, nymph, what are your beads?
Green glass, goblin.Why do you stare at them?
Give them me.
No.
Give them me. Give them me.
No.
I will howl all night in the reeds,
lie in the mud and howl for them.
Goblin, why do you love them so?
They are better than stars or water,
better than voices of winds that sing,
better than any man's fair daughter,
your green glass beads on a silver ring.
Hush, I stole them out of the moon.
Give me your beads, I desire them.
No.
I will howl in a deep lagoon
for your green glass beads, I love them so.
Give them me. Give them.
No.
A wonderful and fun story:
Wicked John and the Devil
The story written out:
http://deareurydice.blogspot.com/...
The video with Richard Chase as storyteller:
http://storylabx.tumblr.com/...
Another favorite short story:
The Devil and Daniel Webster
by Stephen Vincent Benet
http://gutenberg.net.au/...
It's a story they tell in the border country, where Massachusetts joins Vermont and New Hampshire.
Yes, Dan'l Webster's dead--or, at least, they buried him. But every time there's a thunder storm around Marshfield, they say you can hear his rolling voice in the hollows of the sky. And they say that if you go to his grave and speak loud and clear, "Dan'l Webster--Dan'l Webster!" the ground 'll begin to shiver and the trees begin to shake. And after a while you'll hear a deep voice saying, "Neighbour, how stands the Union?" Then you better answer the Union stands as she stood, rock-bottomed and copper sheathed, one and indivisible, or he's liable to rear right out of the ground. At least, that's what I was told when I was a youngster.
You see, for a while, he was the biggest man in the country. He never got to be President, but he was the biggest man. There were thousands that trusted in him right next to God Almighty, and they told stories about him and all the things that belonged to him that were like the stories of patriarchs and such. They said, when he stood up to speak, stars and stripes came right out in the sky, and once he spoke against a river and made it sink into the ground. They said, when he walked the woods with his fishing rod, Killall, the trout would jump out of the streams right into his pockets, for they knew it was no use putting up a fight against him; and, when he argued a case, he could turn on the harps of the blessed and the shaking of the earth underground. That was the kind of man he was, and his big farm up at Marshfield was suitable to him.
The chickens he raised were all white meat down through the drumsticks, the cows were tended like children, and the big ram he called Goliath had horns with a curl like a morning-glory vine and could butt through an iron door. But Dan'l wasn't one of your gentlemen farmers; he knew all the ways of the land, and he'd be up by candlelight to see that the chores got done. A man with a mouth like a mastiff, a brow like a mountain and eyes like burning anthracite--that was Dan'l Webster in his prime. And the biggest case he argued never got written down in the books, for he argued it against the devil, nip and tuck and no holds barred. And this is the way I used to hear it told.
There was a man named Jabez Stone, lived at Cross Corners, New Hampshire. He wasn't a bad man to start with, but he was an unlucky man. If he planted corn, he got borers; if he planted potatoes, he got blight. He had good enough land, but it didn't prosper him; he had a decent wife and children, but the more children he had, the less there was to feed them. If stones cropped up in his neighbours's field, boulders boiled up in his; if he had a horse with the spavins, he'd trade it for one with the staggers and give something extra. There's some folks bound to be like that, apparently. But one day Jabez Stone got sick of the whole business.
He'd been plowing that morning and he'd just broke the plowshare on a rock that he could have sworn hadn't been there yesterday. And, as he stood looking at the plowshare, the off horse began to cough--that ropy kind of cough that means sickness and horse doctors. There were two children down with the measles, his wife was ailing, and he had a whitlow on his thumb. It was about the last straw for Jabez Stone. "I vow," he said, and he looked around him kind of desperate--"I vow it's enough to make a man want to sell his soul to the devil And I would, too, for two cents!"
Then he felt a kind of queerness come over him at having said what he'd said; though, naturally, being a New Hampshireman, he wouldn't take it back. But, all the same, when it got to be evening and, as far as he could see, no notice had been taken, he felt relieved in his mind, for he was a religious man. But notice is always taken, sooner or later, just like the Good Book says. And, sure enough, next day, about supper time, a soft-spoken, dark-dressed stranger drove up in a handsome buggy and asked for Jabez Stone.
Well, Jabez told his family it was a lawyer, come to see him about a legacy. But he knew who it was. He didn't like the looks of the stranger, nor the way he smiled with his teeth.
They were white teeth, and plentiful--some say they were filed to a point, but I wouldn't vouch for that. And he didn't like it when the dog took one look at the stranger and ran away howling, with his tail between his legs. But having passed his word, more or less, he stuck to it, and they went out behind the barn and made their bargain. Jabez Stone had to prick his finger to sign, and the stranger lent him a silver pin. The wound healed clean, but it left a little white scar…
Edgar Allan Poe stories
The Fall of the House of Usher
http://www.gutenberg.org/...
The Masque of the Red Death
http://www.gutenberg.org/...
The Cask of Amontillado
http://www.gutenberg.org/...
25 Halloween Mystery Novels
http://donstuff.wordpress.com/...
A few from the list:
Trick or Treachery: A Murder She Wrote Mystery by Donald Bain and Jessica Fletcher
Halloween brings some unexpected surprises to Cabot Cove, Maine, when a reclusive woman rumored to be a witch turns up dead during the town’s local holiday festivities, and mystery writer Jessica Fletcher must sort through a host of suspects to find the killer.
Hallowed Bones by Carolyn Haines
Sarah Booth Delaney is both a Southern lady and a skilled detective, but her latest case takes her into the murky world of New Orleans where motives for murder, and a list of suspects, are as numerous as the stories of spiritual malfeasance that permeate the air.
Southern Ghost by Carolyn Hart
Bookstore owner Annie Darling must set aside her shame and do some serious sleuthing when her husband Max becomes the prime suspect in an unspecified crime involving a beautiful blonde.
The Fallen Man by Tony Hillerman
Investigating the discovery of a skeleton on Halloween at one of the holiest places in Navajo religion, Jim Chee and the newly retired Joe Leaphorn realize that the body is that of a missing person from one of Joe’s long-unsolved past cases.
The Wailing Wind by Tony Hillerman
The mishandling of a murder scene places Navajo Tribal Police sergeant Jim Chee on the bad side of the FBI and brings ex-lieutenant Joe Leaphorn out of retirement into an old crime he hoped to forget involving an obsessive love and memories of a missing woman.
Tricks: an 87th Precinct Mystery by Ed McBain
On Halloween night in the 87th Precinct, a liquor store owner is shot by costumed children, a headless torso is discovered, and Detective First Class Eileen Burke, disguised as a hooker, hopes to trap a serial killer.
Flight of a Witch by Ellis Peters
When a young woman, missing for five days, suddenly reappears insisting she was gone only two hours, Inspector Felse must investigate the bizarre claim.
Another good Halloween List
http://www.cozy-mystery.com/...
A few from the list:
Ray Bradbury.....A Graveyard for Lunatics
The Halloween Tree
Lillian Jackson Braun.....Cat Who Talked to Ghosts
Shirley Jackson.....The Haunting of Hill House
Harry Kemelman.....Saturday the Rabbi Went Hungry
Nancy Pickard.....Twilight
Donald Westlake, ed.....Mystery for Halloween (Anthology)
Of course there are many vampire tales
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
Dracula by Bram Stoker
The Vampire Chronicles series by Anne Rice
And Frankenstein and other spooky stories
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
I know nothing about this series, but in case you are interested:
Dean Koontz's Frankenstein
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
The series is supposedly a modern updating of the mythology of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, although the similarities are mainly superficial. Set in present day New Orleans, the series follows the activities of Victor Frankenstein, now known as Victor Helios, as he continues to create new life forms for his own purposes. Opposed to his activities are a pair of homicide detectives and Frankenstein's original monster, now known as Deucalion.
While the original Monster was made with parts from dead humans, Victor Frankenstein is now using modern technology to create more creatures, particularly synthetic biology. The new race he is making is constructed and designed from the bottom-up, and can be seen as bio androids, artificial humans made of flesh. Their knowledge and behavior is even based on programs downloaded directly into their brain, which appears to be an advanced wetware computer.
Gahan Wilson's The Ultimate Haunted House
by Gahan Wilson , Nancy A. Collins
Thirteen new tales that explore the eerie rooms of the Ultimate Haunted House in a consummate collaboration between America's macabre genius and leading horror writers. Inspired by the artwork of Gahan Wilson - one of the greatest macabre artists of our time - this thrilling new anthology features thirteen new stories, each exploring a different room of the haunted house.
The Ultimate Werewolf by Byron Preiss
I have really enjoyed the YA series by Lee Nichols
Haunting Emma series
Deception
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
When Emma Vaile's parents leave on mysterious business trip, it gives her the perfect excuse to be a rebellious teen. Throw some parties, get a tattoo (or maybe just a piercing), and enjoy the first few weeks of her junior year. Then her best friend stops talking to her, the cops crash her party, and Emma finds herself in the hands of a new guardian—her college-age "knight in J.Crew armor," Bennett Stern—and on a plane to his museum-like mansion in New England…
Betrayal
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/...
Emma Vaile is the most powerful ghostkeeper in centuries. Which is great when she's battling the wraith-master Neos, but terrible when she's flirting with fellow ghostkeeper (and soul mate) Bennett.
I often think of Rowling's Harry Potter when I think of Halloween.
The invisible Thestrals that pull the carriages
The ghosts
The mirror
The paintings
The broomsticks
The owls
The monster in the dungeon
A werewolf
What about you?
Terry Pratchett has magical creatures, a werewolf, witches and warlocks.
Just to mention a few:
Wyrd Sisters
Witches Abroad
and the stories with Sam Vimes
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
Starting with Guards! Guards! in 1989, the major novels featuring the City Watch are:
Guards! Guards! 1989
Men at Arms 1993
Feet of Clay 1996
Jingo 1997
The Fifth Elephant 1999
Night Watch 2002
Thud! 2005
Snuff 2011
The Night Watch now comprised three men, based in the old Treacle Mine Road Watch House, and all there because they couldn't do anything else. While the Day Watch had become another of the city's gangs, the Night Watch couldn't even manage that. As they saw it, their purpose was to walk down the street chanting "Two o'clock and all's well", and if all wasn't well, they found another street.
This changed when Constable Carrot joined, and the Watch saved the city from a dragon. Following the destruction of their Watch House, they moved to larger premises in Pseudopolis Yard (a name remniscent of Scotland Yard) and started recruiting more members, especially from ethnic minorities such as dwarfs, trolls and the undead. The Watch has even admitted a vampire (under duress, of course; Vimes detests vampires for that same reason he does kings and assassins — in his mind, they prey on people). When they saved the Patrician's life Vetinari agreed to increase the force's stature, with new Section Houses being built around the city. The remains of the Day Watch were incorporated into a new City Watch, commanded by Samuel Vimes...
The City Watch also has an ancient oath:
I, [recruit's name], do solemnly swear by [recruit's deity of choice] to uphold the Laws and Ordinances of the city of Ankh-Morpork, serve the public trust, and defend the subjects of His/Her [delete whichever is inappropriate] Majesty [name of reigning monarch] without fear, favour, or thought of personal safety; to pursue evil-doers and protect the innocent, laying down my life if necessary in the cause of said duty, so help me [aforesaid deity]. Gods Save the King/Queen [delete which is inappropriate].
Vimes, with his slightly tarnished personality, sees the oath as leaving huge amounts of freedom for the officer, and ruler after ruler has failed to notice that the City Watch's oath says absolutely nothing about obeying orders and is firmly worded in favour of the subjects rather than the government. Carrot Ironfoundersson, with his extreme literal sense, instructs recruits to say it precisely as written, including punctuation ("... and defend the subjects of His slash Her bracket delete whichever is inappropriate end-bracket Majesty ...") completely avoiding the problem of naming the reigning monarch.
During the events of Men At Arms, then-Acting-Constable Detritus recruits a number of Trolls into the Watch, swearing them in using instead a Trollish oath: "I will do what I told; otherwise I get my goohuloog head kicked in."
My most loved poem for the season
The Highwayman
by Alfred Noyes
http://www.poemhunter.com/...
The wind was a torrent of darkness upon the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight looping the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding--
Riding--riding--
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn door.
He'd a French cocked hat on his forehead, and a bunch of lace at his chin;
He'd a coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of fine doe-skin.
They fitted with never a wrinkle; his boots were up to his thigh!
And he rode with a jeweled twinkle--
His rapier hilt a-twinkle--
His pistol butts a-twinkle, under the jeweled sky.
Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn-yard,
He tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred,
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter--
Bess, the landlord's daughter--
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.
Dark in the dark old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked
Where Tim, the ostler listened--his face was white and peaked--
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy hay,
But he loved the landlord's daughter--
The landlord's black-eyed daughter;
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say:
"One kiss, my bonny sweetheart; I'm after a prize tonight,
But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light.
Yet if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way."
He stood upright in the stirrups; he scarce could reach her hand,
But she loosened her hair in the casement! His face burnt like a brand
As the sweet black waves of perfume came tumbling o'er his breast,
Then he kissed its waves in the moonlight
(O sweet black waves in the moonlight!),
And he tugged at his reins in the moonlight, and galloped away to the west.
He did not come in the dawning; he did not come at noon.
And out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon,
When the road was a gypsy's ribbon over the purple moor,
The redcoat troops came marching--
Marching--marching--
King George's men came marching, up to the old inn-door.
They said no word to the landlord; they drank his ale instead,
But they gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of her narrow bed.
Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets by their side;
There was Death at every window,
And Hell at one dark window,
For Bess could see, through her casement, the road that he would ride.
They had bound her up at attention, with many a sniggering jest!
They had tied a rifle beside her, with the barrel beneath her breast!
"Now keep good watch!" and they kissed her. She heard the dead man say,
"Look for me by moonlight,
Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though Hell should bar the way."
She twisted her hands behind her, but all the knots held good!
She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood!
They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years,
Till, on the stroke of midnight,
Cold on the stroke of midnight,
The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least was hers!
The tip of one finger touched it, she strove no more for the rest;
Up, she stood up at attention, with the barrel beneath her breast.
She would not risk their hearing, she would not strive again,
For the road lay bare in the moonlight,
Blank and bare in the moonlight,
And the blood in her veins, in the moonlight, throbbed to her love's refrain.
Tlot tlot, tlot tlot! Had they heard it? The horse-hooves, ringing clear;
Tlot tlot, tlot tlot, in the distance! Were they deaf that they did not hear?
Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,
The highwayman came riding--
Riding--riding--
The redcoats looked to their priming! She stood up straight and still.
Tlot tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot tlot, in the echoing night!
Nearer he came and nearer! Her face was like a light!
Her eyes grew wide for a moment, she drew one last deep breath,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight--
Her musket shattered the moonlight--
Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him--with her death.
He turned, he spurred to the West; he did not know who stood
Bowed, with her head o'er the casement, drenched in her own red blood!
Not till the dawn did he hear it, and his face grew grey to hear
How Bess, the landlord's daughter,
The landlord's black-eyed daughter,
Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.
Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high!
Blood-red were his spurs in the golden noon, wine-red was his velvet coat
When they shot him down in the highway,
Down like a dog in the highway,
And he lay in his blood in the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat.
And still on a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a gypsy's ribbon looping the purple moor,
The highwayman comes riding--
Riding--riding--
The highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.
Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-yard,
He taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked and barred,
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter--
Bess, the landlord's daughter--
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.
What are your favorite Hallowe'en poems and stories?
Diaries of the week:
Write On! Naming Your Characters
by SensibleShoes
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Thursday Classical Music OPUS 56: Beethoven's Fifth Symphony (finale)
by Dumbo
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Monday Musical Meditations - MMM9 - Gian Carlo Menotti (1911 - 2007)
by proud tobeliberal
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Limelite says:
By popular acclaim, we will be discussing a work of nonfiction, Waiting for the Taliban: A Journey Through Northern Afghanistan by Anna Badkhen. $2.99 Kindle…
(Read more about the book in her diary:
http://www.dailykos.com/... )
This is a small book and may only require a single discussion diary, so please have read the book by our meet date of Nov. 3rd, 2 PM ET. Thank you. And see you then!
NOTE: plf515 has book talk on Wednesday mornings early.