The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 15: “The Return of Sir Richard Grenville” By Robert E. Howard
“Rise up, rise up,” Sir Richard said,
“The hounds of doom are free;
“The slayers come to take your head
“To hang on the ju-ju tree.”–Robert E. Howard
Tag: HWA
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 13: “Song at Midnight” By Robert E. Howard
A slow-worm spoke from the gallows foot:
“Death is spoils for a crow to loot.
“The winds and the rain they worked their will,
“The kites and the ravens have had their fill,
“But last of all when the chains broke free,
“The fruit of the gallows came to me.
“Men and their works, so swiftly past,
“Come to a feast for the worms at last.
“Here I have gnawed on this marrow good,
“Where now I gnaw on this crumbling wood.
“For men and their works are a feast for me—
“The bones, and the noose, and the gallows tree.”–Robert E. Howard
Halloween Horror: “The Hound” By H.P. Lovecraft
In my tortured ears there sounds unceasingly a nightmare whirring and flapping, and a faint, distant baying as of some gigantic hound. It is not dream—it is not, I fear, even madness—for too much has already happened to give me these merciful doubts. St. John is a mangled corpse; I alone know why, and such is my knowledge that I am about to blow out my brains for fear I shall be mangled in the same way. Down unlit and illimitable corridors of eldritch phantasy sweeps the black, shapeless Nemesis that drives me to self-annihilation.–H.P. Lovecraft
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 12: “The Witch” By Mary Elizabeth Coleridge
The cutting wind is a cruel foe.
I dare not stand in the blast.
My hands are stone, and my voice a groan,
And the worst of death is past.
I am but a little maiden still,
My little white feet are sore.
Oh, lift me over the threshold, and let me in at the door!–Mary Elizabeth Coleridge
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 11: “The Valley of Unrest” By Edgar Allan Poe
Now each visitor shall confess
The sad valley’s restlessness.
Nothing there is motionless—
Nothing save the airs that brood
Over the magic solitude.
Ah, by no wind are stirred those trees
That palpitate like the chill seas
Around the misty Hebrides!–Edgar Allan Poe
“Ligeia” Edgar Allan Poe’s Vampire Classic
I CANNOT, for my soul, remember how, when, or even precisely where, I first became acquainted with the lady Ligeia. Long years have since elapsed, and my memory is feeble through much suffering. –Edgar Allan Poe
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 10: “Solomon Kane’s Homecoming” By Robert E. Howard
The white gulls wheeled above the cliffs, the air was slashed with foam,
The long tides moaned along the strand when Solomon Kane came home.
He walked in silence strange and dazed through the little Devon town,
His gaze, like a ghost’s come back to life, roamed up the streets and down.–Robert E. Howard
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 7: “The Shadow on the Stone” By Thomas Hardy
I thought her behind my back,
Yea, her I long had learned to lack,
And I said: ‘I am sure you are standing behind me,
Though how do you get into this old track?’
And there was no sound but the fall of a leaf
As a sad response; and to keep down grief
I would not turn my head to discover
That there was nothing in my belief.
–Thomas Hardy (The Shadow on the Stone)
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 6: “The Owl” By Jeffrey LeBlanc
And freezing, the Owl never leaving, still is staring, still is staring
Perched upon Great Pan’s limbs just above my swamp shore;
Perched, twisted head, and stares as the dead to distant Stygian moors,
His Erebus eyes, become gilded fireflies, flickering to flame seething, possibly dreaming,
Whilst leprous moon overhead wakes the forgotten dead in shadows before;
And as I lie waiting my flickering shadow anticipating those ghostly shadows before
Cackles the Owl “Katina” evermore!”–Jeffrey LeBlanc
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 3: “The Haunted Oak” By Paul Laurence Dunbar
And never more shall leaves come forth
On the bough that bears the ban;
I am burned with dread, I am dried and dead,
From the curse of a guiltless man.
The Best Halloween Poems–Episode 2: “Ghost House” By Robert Frost
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 Best Halloween Poems–Episode 1: “Haunted” By Siegfried Sassoon
An evil creature in the twilight looping,
Flapped blindly in his face. Beating it off,
He screeched in terror, and straightway something clambered
Heavily from an oak, and dropped, bent double,
To shamble at him zigzag, squat and bestial.
“Blood & Dust” By Jeffrey LeBlanc (Narrated By Author)
The Pirate slaughtered the captain’s maid;
(Antoine Valterre became the Devil’s king.)
And her broken heart rotted holding the blade.
(A vampire’s thirst is a deadly thing.)–JL
“The Spider” By Julian Machen (Narrated By Jeffrey LeBlanc)
And when thy heart drummed its horrid beat, dreadful the writhing of its legs and
the gnashing of its teeth?-JM
Robert E. Howard’s “Rattle the Bones”—A Solomon Kane Tale: Episode 1 (Narrated By Jeffrey LeBlanc)
“Great God!” he muttered as cold sweat formed on his body. “This thing is beyond all reason, yet with mine own eyes I see it! Two vows have here been kept…”–Robert E Howard
Jeffrey LeBlanc 