Of the long dead, who lived therein,
Paused by the cold hearth I felt the tendrils of hot sin,
Call of the bed, lover’s sigh made my head spin,
Head all aswirl, my mind lit in colors ablaze,
Will I survive this Christmas witch’s love haze?
Will I survive this Christmas witch’s love haze?
–CHRISTMAS WITCH
‘The transference of emotion is a phenomenon so common, so constantly witnessed, that mankind in general have long ceased to be conscious of its existence, as a thing worth our wonder or consideration, regarding it as being as natural and commonplace as the transference of things that act by the ascertained laws of matter. Nobody, for instance, is surprised, if, when the room is too hot, the opening of a window causes the cold fresh air of outside to be transferred into the room, and in the same way no one is surprised when into the same room, perhaps, which we will imagine as being peopled with dull and gloomy persons, there enters some one of fresh and sunny mind, who instantly brings into the stuffy mental atmosphere a change analogous to that of the opened windows.
–E.F. Benson (THE TERROR BY NIGHT)
‘Night is approaching. I can feel the change of temperature in the tomb. The worms are becoming more active in their squirming all around me. The maggots inch by the dozens across my chest. I hear the excited squealing and clawing of the rats too.’ –Jeffrey LeBlanc (SARAH ETERNALLY ENTOMBED)
“Forasmuch as it is ordained of God that all flesh hath spirit and thereby taketh on spiritual powers, so, also, the spirit hath powers of the flesh, even when it is gone out of the flesh and liveth as a thing apart, as many a violence performed by wraith and lemure sheweth. And there be who say that man is not single in this, but the beasts have the like evil inducement, and – ”
—MEDITATIONS (DENNEKER)
The grass so green, we so loved,
Let it grow endlessly around my quiet tomb,
Whilst you dance and sing in silver showers little dove,
Kissed by shimmering dewdrops from the blades so wet,
Remember me always, long after our love smolders red ember,
Keep my soul scorched in your heart—never to forget. Always remember.
–Dweller of the Dark (LOVE UNDEAD)
‘Tonight, I have died. Tomorrow morning I will die again in thirty million brains, caught like a fly in a web, sucked dry by the multitentacled public, and flushed on through the transits of their minds to be replaced by: HEIRESS MARRIES DUKE! INCOME TAX INCREASE DUE! COAL MINERS STRIKE!’ –RAY BRADBURY (It Burns Me Up!)
“Villains!” I shrieked, “dissemble no more! I admit the deed! –tear up the planks! –here, here! –it is the beating of his hideous heart!”.’ –Edgar Allan Poe (The Tell-Tale Heart)
Ye little skelpie-limmer’s face!
I daur you try sic sportin’,
As seek the foul thief ony place,
For him to spae your fortune.
Nae doubt but ye may get a sight!
Great cause ye hae to fear it;
For mony a ane has gotten a fright,
And lived and died deleeret
On sic a night.
–Robert Burns (Hallowe’en)
“And then she died. How? I do not know. I no longer know; but one evening she came home wet, for it was raining heavily, and the next day she coughed, and she coughed for about a week, and took to her bed. What happened I do not remember now, but doctors came, wrote and went away. Medicines were brought, and some women made her drink them. Her hands were hot, her forehead was burning, and her eyes bright and sad. When I spoke to her, she answered me, but I do not remember what we said. I have forgotten everything, everything, everything! She died, and I very well remember her slight, feeble sigh. The nurse said: ‘Ah! and I understood, I understood!’
–Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant (Was It A Dream)
Could it have been Love that made us immortal?
I ask you ancient silver moons of old for I am alone,
Answer me I beg! For all the golden suns are deaf and blind to my plea, To my plea
To my beloved who sits quietly in this forgotten tomb,
Damn the worm! You will not kiss my love wan and cold tenderly.
–CHARLIE’S DREAM
Dweller of the Dark
2 days ago (edited)
Haunting your hearts real soon.
‘He went right over to the pool and crouched down on the rim in his white nightgown, and I heard his whispered voice calling, “Alannah! Alannah!” in hushed tones. And then suddenly a little rippling came on the water, a vapor
that was not there before.’—August Derleth
One of the most haunting ghost stories we’ve read in a while. Maybe since GHOST STORY by Peter Straub. #ghost #ghoststories #lovestory #ghoststory #horrorgram #horrorstory #love #Halloween
Intelligence without the soul to balance it must be of necessity evil—JOHN STEINBECK (The Affair at 7 Rue de M–)
When the Horror passing speech
Hunted us along,
Each laid hold on each, and each
Found the other strong.
In the teeth of things forbid
And reason overthrown,
Helen stood by me, she did,
Helen all alone.
–Rudyard Kipling
Resting immortal amongst the asphodels,
Resting immortal amongst the asphodels,
Resting immortal in visions wonder-drowned,
In Lethean ecstasy starlit bound,
Ageless, lost, locked away from the cruel world,
Showered in golden magic and glory crowned.
–CHALICE
HIS voice came to us again. He said, at first, that he saw nothing in the abyss below him. Then he gasped, swayed, and almost lost his balance. We could see the sweat standing out on his brow and neck, soaking his blue shirt. There were things in the abyss, he said in hoarse tones, great shapes that were like blobs of utter blackness, yet which he knew to be alive. From the central masses of their beings he could see them shoot forth incredibly long, filamentine tentacles. They moved themselves forward and backward — horizontally, but could not move vertically, it seemed. They were, he thought, nothing but living shadows.
Robert A.W. Lowndes (THE ABYSS)
Jeffrey LeBlanc 