Day: August 4, 2022

Silence

A Sonnet

There are some qualities — some incorporate things
That have a double life — life aptly made,
The type of that twin entity which springs
From matter and light, evinced in solid and shade.
There is a two-fold Silence — sea and shore —
Body and soul. One dwells in lonely places,
Newly with grass o’ergrown. Some solemn graces —
Some human memories and tearful lore,
Render him terrorless — his name’s “No More.”
He is the corporate Silence — dread him not!
No power hath he of evil in himself;
But should some urgent fate — untimely lot!
Bring thee to meet his shadow (nameless elf,
Who haunteth the dim regions where hath trod
No foot of man) — commend thyself to God!

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Edgar Allan Poe

Originally Published in 1840

Image by Edmund Dulac

Sonnet

“Seldom we find,” says Solomon Don Dunce,
“Half an idea in the profoundest sonnet.
Through all the flimsy things we see at once
As easily as through a Naples bonnet —
Trash of all trash! — how can a lady don it?
Yet heavier far than your Petrarchan stuff —
Owl-downy nonsense that the faintest puff
Twirls into trunk-paper the while you con it.”
And, veritably, Sol is right enough.
The general Petrarchanities are arrant
Bubbles — ephemeral and so transparent —
But this is, now, — you may depend upon it —
Stable, opaque, immortal — all by dint
Of the dear names that lie concealed within’t.

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Edgar Allan Poe

Originally Published in 1848