Worms

Fringes post about her cat's tapeworm remind me about how much I dislike worms as a result of the horror I felt after reading Poe's poem, The Conqueror Worm. The thought of worms squirming about in another live creature appalls me. I definitely wanted to be cremeated after reading this poem--even though it does upset the circle of life. Come to think about it , there are many nasty poems about worms... the worms crawl in, the worms crawl out... etc.

I have always been a Poe fan, even though he wasn't highly regarded in his own time. The Stephen King of his times. Any other Poe fans out there.


THE CONQUEROR WORM (Edgar Allan Poe)

Lo! 'tis a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years!
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.

Mimes, in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
And hither and thither fly-
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their Condor wings
Invisible Woe!

That motley drama- oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased for evermore,
By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the self-same spot,
And much of Madness, and more of Sin,
And Horror the soul of the plot.

But see, amid the mimic rout
A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes!- it writhes!- with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
And seraphs sob at vermin fangs
In human gore imbued.

Out- out are the lights- out all!
And, over each quivering form,
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
While the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"
And its hero the Conqueror Worm.