Friday, May 15, 2020

The Nevermore-To-Be

Read "The Nevermore-To-Be" at The Eldritch Dark:

http://www.eldritchdark.com/writings/poetry/366/the-nevermore-to-be

This poem from Clark Ashton Smith (CAS) is a darkly beautiful paean to a (presumably) brief dalliance:


Lady, let us pluck delight
Only from a forfeit night,
From the bedded myrtles strewn
'Neath a never-risen moon.


The use of tetrameter with strong end rhymes reminds me of the witches' chants from Macbeth ("Double, double, toil and trouble; / Fire burn and cauldron bubble.").  That association, along with the repetition of the word "sorcery" in the first and last stanzas,  lends "The Nevermore-To-Be" a touch of the supernatural, giving it CAS' own distinct artistic stamp.

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