|
 |
The Song of Hiawatha's Raven
Alexander "Sasha" Volokh
(The first stanza of "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe
in the style of The Song of Hiawatha
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)
Note: Can be sung to the tune of "Tom's Diner"
by Suzanne Vega
I was working on a midnight,
And I pondered, almost sleeping,
Very dreary was this midnight,
For I was extremely tired --
Very tired while meditating,
Very weakly was I thinking,
O so weary and exhausted,
Feeling languor and depression:
Reading books containing legends,
Volumes that were quite forgotten,
Lore that sank into oblivion,
Many stories disregarded,
Many overlooked traditions,
Which were nonetheless enticing,
Ever quaint and so compelling,
Curious and yet obsessive.
I was nodding, I was dozing,
Sleep had almost come upon me --
One could say that I was napping,
One could say that I was dreaming:
I was drifting to the realm,
The realm of Morpheus the sleeper,
Morpheus the dream-inflicter,
'Till the wiser light of morning.
Then some thing disturbed my silence,
Broke my aura of reflection,
Stopped my dreaming by a tapping,
By a knocking in my doorway,
By a sign of someone's presence,
Of an uninvited presence
Underneath the bust of Pallas,
Just below the Roman sculpture.
Then I found a plain solution
To this mystery perplexing,
To this mystifying problem:
"'Tis some visitor who calls here,
'Tis some unexpected caller,
'Tis some stranger in the darkness
Who is knocking at my doorway,
In my old and gloomy doorway."
This, I reasoned, was the answer,
Was the evident solution:
Nothing else could be the purpose
Of this knocking in my hallway,
In my old and gloomy hallway.
Return to literature page
Return to home page
|
