Complete poems of Edgar Allan Poe / [by Edgar Allan Poe] ; collected, edited, and arranged with memoir, textual notes and bibliography by J.H. Whitty [electronic text]

APPENDIX

APPENDIX

I
POEMS IN THE CHASE VOLUME

AMONG other poems attributed to Poe are those published in the "Miscellaneous Selections And Original Pieces In Prose And Verse. By Elizabeth Chase. Published For The Editor By E. J. Cole. Richard J. Metchett Printer. 1821."

This volume printed at Baltimore contains "Monody On The Death Of General Joseph Sterett By A Very Young Gentleman Of Baltimore" and is signed "Edgar"; also twenty other pieces by the same hand — "A Dream "; "To Sorrow"; "Twilight "; "A Lily "; "To Despondency," etc. A note to one states that they were composed by a youth of eighteen. The volume is often sold at the book-auction houses and by book dealers, where the following note is met with as an advertisement:

"These poems have been attributed to Edgar Allan Poe, and the age given as 'eighteen' is possibly a fiction to disguise the extreme youth of the poet. Poe at this period was writing verse, though still at school, for it is related that about this time Mr. Allan showed a manuscript of poems written by him to the young ladies of Richmond. Though as yet no evidence has been brought forward to prove conclusively that these poems were the production of Poe, still upon a closer examination of them, and particularly after a comparison of them with the 'Fugitive Pieces' (written in 1821) and published with Tamerlane in 1827, it is difficult to believe otherwise than that they were by the same

hand. The decided preference in the choice of doleful and melancholy themes, the frequent employment of imagery drawn from the beauties of nature — the heavens, flowers, etc., and the occasional reiteration of liquid sounds and alliterative combinations in the versification here exhibited, it seems, all tend to strengthen this belief."

A study and investigation of these poems leads to the belief that they were probably written by an early Baltimore literary character whose last name was "Edgar." His family connections have been met with, but they could not give definite information. In efforts to trace the poems other similar poetry written about the same period was found by Baltimore poets. Here are some lines signed E. A. S., perhaps as Poesque as any in the Chase volume: —

"What clouds my brow, O, ask me not,It brings upon my mind, my care worn lot,It tells me of the many joys I 've lost;While on life's ocean tempest toss'd."

F. W. Thomas was studying law in Baltimore about 1821 and a close associate of Poe's brother William Henry Leonard Poe, who also resided in that city. He made no mention of these poems in his Recollections of E. A. Poe. If Poe had been about Baltimore in 1821 and especially publishing poetry Thomas would likely have had some knowledge of it.

II

The following are from The Yankee and Boston Literary Gazette, New Series, July-December, 1829, John Neal, Editor: —

"TO CORRESPONDENTS

* 1.1If E. A. P. of Baltimore — whose lines about Heaven, though he professes to regard

them as altogether superior to anything in the whole range of American poetry, save two or three trifles referred to, are, though nonsense, rather exquisite nonsense — would but do himself justice, he might make a beautiful and perhaps a magnificent poem. There is a good deal here to justify such a hope:

Dim vales and shadowy floods,And cloudy-looking woods,Whose forms we can't discoverFor the tears that — drip all over.The moonlight————fallsOver hamlets, over halls.Wherever they may be,O'er the strange woods, o'er the sea —O'er spirits on the wing,O'er every drowsy thing —And buries them up quiteIn a labyrinth of light,And then how deep! — Oh deep!Is the passion of their sleep!

"He should have signed it, Bah! . . . We have no room for others."

"TO CORRESPONDENTS

* 1.2

Many papers intended for this number have been put aside for the next, . . . Among others are Night — The Magician — Unpublished Poetry (being specimens of a book about to appear at Baltimore)."

"UNPUBLISHED POETRY * 1.3 The following passages are from the manuscript-works of a young author, about to be published in Baltimore. He is entirely a stranger to us, but with all their faults, if the remainder of Al Aaraaf and Tamerlane are as good as the body of the extracts here given — to say nothing of the more extraordinary parts, he will deserve

to stand high — very high — in the estimation of the shining brotherhood. Whether he will do so however, must depend, not so much upon his worth now in mere poetry, as upon his worth hereafter in something yet loftier and more generous — we allude to the stronger properties of the mind, to the magnanimous determination that enables a youth to endure the present, whatever the present may be, in the hope, or rather in the belief, the fixed, unwavering belief, that in the future he will find his reward. 'I am young,' he says in a letter to one who has laid it on our table for a good purpose,

'I am young — not yet twenty — am a poet — if deep worship of all beauty can make me one — and wish to be so in the more common meaning of the word. I would give the world to embody one half the ideas afloat in my imagination. (By the way, do you remember — or did you ever read the exclamation of Shelley about Shakspeare? — "What a number of ideas must have been afloat before such an author could arise!") I appeal to you as a man that loves the same beauty which I adore — the beauty of the natural blue sky and the sunshiny earth — there can be no tie more strong than that of brother for brother — it is not so much that they love one another, as that they both love the same parent — their affections are always running in the same direction — the same channel — and cannot help mingling.

I am and have been, from my childhood, an idler. It cannot therefore be said that "I left a calling for this idle trade,A duty broke — a father disobeyed" —for I have no father — nor mother.

I am about to publish a volume of "Poems," the greater part written before I was fifteen. Speaking about "Heaven," * 1.4

the editor of the Yankee says, "He might write a beautiful, if not a magnificent poem" — (the very first words of encouragement I ever remember to have heard). I am very certain that as yet I have not written either — but that I can, I will take oath — if they will give me time.

The poems to be published are "Al Aaraaf" — "Tamerlane" — one about four, and the other about three hundred lines, with smaller pieces. "Al Aaraaf" has some good poetry, and much extravagance, which I have not had time to throw away.

* 1.5

"Al Aaraaf" is a tale of another world — the star discovered by Tycho Brahe, which appeared and disappeared so suddenly — or rather, it is no tale at all. I will insert an extract, about the palace of its presiding Deity, in which you will see that I have supposed many of the lost sculptures of our world to have flown (in spirit) to the star "Al Aaraaf" — a delicate place, more suited to their divinity. Uprear'd upon such height arose a pileOf gorgeous columns on th' unburthened air —* 1.6 Flashing, from Pariah marble, that twin-smile Far down upon the wave that sparkled there,And nursled the young mountain in its lair:Of molten stars their pavement —such as fallThro' the ebon air — besilvering the pallOf their own dissolution while they die —Adorning, then, the dwellings of the sky;A dome by linked light * 1.7 from Heaven let down,Sat gently on these columns as a crown;A window of one circular diamond there

Looked out above into the purple air, And rays from God shot down that meteor chain And hallow'd all the beauty twice again, Save when, between th' Empyrean, and that ring, Some eager spirit flapp'd a dusky wing: But, on the pillars, seraph eyes have seen The dimness of this world: that grayish green That nature loves the best for Beauty's grave, Lurked in each cornice — round each architrave — And every sculptur'd cherub thereabout That from his marble dwelling ventured* 1.8 out, Seemed earthly in the shadow of his niche — Archaian statues in a world so rich? Friezes from Tadmor and Persepolis — From Balbec and the stilly, clear abyss Of beautiful Gomorrah!— oh! the wave Is now upon thee — but too late to save! Far down within the crystal of the lake Thy swollen pillars tremble — and so quake The hearts of many wanderers who look in Thy luridness of beauty — and of sin.

Another — — Silence is the voice of God —Ours is a world of words: quiet we call"Silence" — which is the merest word of all.Here Nature speaks — and ev'n ideal thingsFlap shadowy sounds from visionary wings;But ah! not so, when in the realms on high,The eternal voice of God is moving by,And the red winds are withering in the sky!

From Tamerlane —

The fever'd diadem on my browI claimed and won usurpingly:Hath not the same fierce heirdom givenRome to the Cæsar — this to me?

The heritage of a kingly mind And a proud spirit, which hath striven Triumphantly with human-kind.

* * * *

On mountain soil I first drew life, The mists of the Taglay have shed Nightly their dews upon my head; And, I believe, the winged strife And tumult of the headlong air Hath nestled in my very hair.

* * * *

So late from Heaven, that dew, it fell, Mid dreams of one unholy night, Upon me with the touch of Hell — While the red flashing of the light From clouds that hung, like banners, o'er, Seem'd then to my half-closing eye The pageantry of monarchy; And the deep trumpet-thunder's roar Came hurriedly upon me telling Of human battle (near me swelling).

* * * *

The rain came down upon my head Unshelter'd, and the heavy wind Was giantlike — so thou, my mind! It was but man, I thought, who shed Laurels upon me — and the rush — The torrent of the chilly air Gurgled within my ear the crush Of empires — with the captive's prayer; The hum of suitors, and the tone Of flattery round a sovereign-throne.

* * * *

Young Love's first lesson is the heart: For mid that sunshine and those smiles, When, from our little cares apart, And laughing at her girlish wiles, I'd throw me on her throbbing breast, And pour my spirit out in tears,

There was no need to speak the rest — No need to quiet any fears Of her — who ask'd no reason why, But turned on me her quiet eye.

Tamerlane dying —

Father! I firmly do believe —I know — for Death, who comes for meFrom regions of the blest afar,(Where there is nothing to deceive)Hath left his iron gate ajar;And rays of truth you cannot seeAre flashing through Eternity —I do believe that Eblis hathA snare in every human path;Else how when in the holy groveI wandered of the idol, Love,Who daily scents his snowy wingsWith incense of burnt offeringsFrom the most undefiled things —Whose pleasant bowers are yet so rivenAbove with trelliced rays from HeavenNo mote may shun — no tiniest flyThe lightning of his eagle eye.How was it that Ambition creptUnseen, amid the revels there,Till, growing bold, he laugh'd and leaptIn the tangles of Love's brilliant hair?

Passage from the minor poems.

If my peace hath flown awayIn a night — or in a day —In a vision — or in none —Is it therefore the less gone?I am standing mid the roarOf a weatherbeaten shore,And I hold within my handSome particles of sand —

How few! and how they creep Through my fingers to the deep! My early hopes? — No — they Went gloriously away, Like lightning from the sky At once — and so will I."

Having allowed our youthful writer to be heard in his own behalf, — what more can we do for the lovers of genuine poetry? Nothing. They who are judges will not need more; and they who are not — why waste words upon them? We shall not.

III
MYTHICAL POE POEMS

Quite a number of mythical Poe poems have been published. The three widest circulated of such poems are "The Fire Legend," "Leonainie," and "Kelah."

The following named pamphlet written in heroic couplets and comprising nine hundred and fifty lines and signed Lavante has also been reprinted with an effort to show that Poe was the author: "The Poets and Poetry of America. A Satire. Philadelphia William S. Young — No. 173 Race Street 1847."

IV
LETTERS RELATING TO POE

A collection of eight autograph letters of Thomas W. White, proprietor of the Southern Literary Messenger, written to Lucian Minor (at one time associated with him on the Messenger), during Poe's first year with the magazine, have never been published. They serve to throw new light

on Poe's connections with the Messenger during his early career in Richmond, Virginia.

• (1) A. L. S., 1 p., 4to. RICHMOND, August 18, 1835

  I have, my dear sir, been compelled to part with Mr. Sparhawk as regular editor .... He will, however, continue to assist me. Mr. Poe is here also. He tarries one month and will aid me all that lies in his power.

• (2) A. L. S., 2 pp., 4to. RICHMOND, September 8, 1835

  Poe is now in my employ — not as editor. He is unfortunately rather dissipated — and therefore I can place very little reliance upon him. His disposition is quite amiable. He will be some assistance to me in proof-reading — at least I hope so.

• (3) A. L. S., 2 pp., 4to. RICHMOND, September 21, 1835

  Poe has flew the track already. His habits were not good. He is in addition a victim of melancholy. I should not be at all astonished to hear that he had been guilty of suicide.

• (4) A. L. S., 3 pp., 4to.RICHMOND, October 1, 1835

  I have just seen Mr. Heath. He thinks he can manage the autography for me. He proposes striking out Cooper's and Irving's names. I will not put the article in till I hear from you. Give me your candid opinion of it. Poe is its author.

• (5) A. L. S., 1 p. 4to.RICHMOND, October 20, 1835

  Mr. Poe, who is with me again, read (your address) over by copy with great care. He is very much pleased with it —

• ...

  in fact he passes great encomiums upon it to me, and intends noticing it under the head of Reviews.

• (6) A. L. S., 1 p., small folio. RICHMOND, October 24, 1835

  Suppose you send me a modest paragraph, mentioning . . . the paper is now under my own editorial management, assisted by several gentlemen of distinguished literary attainments. You may introduce Mr. Poe's name as amongst those engaged to contribute for its columns — taking care not to say as editor.

• (7) A. L. S., 3 pp., 4to.RICHMOND, November 23, 1835

  You are altogether right about the Leslie critique. Poe has evidently shown himself no lawyer — whatever else he may be.

• (8) A. L. S., 2 pp. 4to. RICHMOND, December 25, 1835

  All the critical notices are from the pen of Poe — who, I rejoice to tell you, still keeps from the Bottle.

There is also among the collection a letter addressed to Lucian Minor altogether in Poe's autograph, but signed by Thomas W. White.

Notes

• * 1.1

  September, 1829.
• * 1.2

  November, 1829.
• * 1.3

  December, 1829.
• * 1.4

  A poem by the author of "Al Aaraaf," mentioned in No. III: 168
• * 1.5

  This will remind the reader of the following anecdote. Your sermon was too long sir — why did n't you make it shorter? I had n't time. — [Editor's Note]
• * 1.6

  Alluding to a prior part.
• * 1.7

  The idea of linked light is beautiful; but, the moment you read it aloud, the beauty is gone. To say link-ed light would be queer enough, notwithstanding Moore's "wreath-ed shell"; but to say link'd-light would spoil the rhythm. [Editor's Note.]
• * 1.8

  The word in the original was peered: we have changed it for the reason stated above. — [Editor's Note.]