An Edgar Allen Poe Halloween

The nights are getting longer. I no longer wake to bright sun light streaming in through the tightly drawn blinds. Instead, I sleep with my blinds open allowing the streetlights to cast an orange glow on my room. It makes objects look unfamiliar. I don't recognize my own hands and even a familiar friend in the form of a stuffed animal looks distorted and different.

The sun was just beginning to lighten the sky as I walked to the bus this morning. As I rounded the top of a hill nearing the end of my short walk to the station, I was met with a rather large glossy black raven. As soon as I saw him/her, I stopped. The raven was standing right in the middle of my path frozen like a statue. We stared blankly at each other for a split second, until I broke gaze, crossed to the other side of the street and kept going. As I passed I whispered, Nevermore. The crow had won.

This is for him:

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door,
"Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door-
Only this, and nothing more."

Continue reading The Raven.

There are other great Edgar Allen Poe poems, one of my favorites is The Tell-Tale Heart.

Tonight, I'm going to turn all the lights off at my apartment, light a bunch of candles and read Edgar Allen Poe by candlelight.

The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things

Hieronymus Bosch, The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things, oil on wood panels, 1485.

In the past when my friends have told me I have road rage, I would politely laugh at their comment and push it away. There’s no way that I have road rage, or rage of any kind for that matter. Really, me? Sweet innocent ole’ me? But. Slowly I am beginning to realize, they may have been touching at the truth. I am not a violent person. I do not seek out objects to shoot, or launch or destroy, but a few years ago, sitting in traffic on the middle of a beautiful afternoon, I turned to my passenger and revealed this: I wish I had a rocket launcher to blow up all these cars and get them out of my way. Wrath, my first deadly sin.

Every day I ask myself, is there something more? Greed, my second deadly sin.

I have 36 bottles of wine in my apartment. Eleven of which are open. Seven of which I have tasted. All of which were free. Gluttony, my third deadly sin.

On most mornings I ride the bus to work. It picks me up at the entrance of my apartment complex, approximately three tenths of a mile from my front door. It drops me off 20 feet from the door of work. My first week of riding the bus, I walked out of my front door, to my car. I got in my car, turned it on and drove less than a minute. Parked. Got out and boarded the bus. Sloth, my fourth deadly sin.

Every day I look in the mirror and say: I wish I had a different life. Envy, my fifth sin.

There has not been a man I do not find attractive in his own form. There has been few men that I have not been able to resist. There has been one that occupies my mind. There has been none that can fill my desire. Lust, my sixth sin.

I lie to get others to see me. Pride, my last sin.

The four last things (death, judgement, hell, glory) I live each day.

I'm aaaalivvveeee.

At the request of a dear friend and also for the sake of being a blogger, this post is an attempt to keep my blog alive. Yes people, I’m still here! Are you?

Additionally, all posts for this month will be themed for Halloween. My most favorite of holidays.