My Relationship with Edgar Allan Poe
I have reached these lands but newly From an ultimate dim Thule — From a wild weird clime that lieth, sublime Out of SPACE — out of TIME
The objective of this piece is only to touch on a few things that come to mind, to start on this topic which no doubt will be continued as I will most certainly recall some things I will surely forget to include now. There have been so many personal ah-ha moments in my minuscule reading about the famous author, known for his mixture of light and dark in his work and personality, that I can’t keep track of them all. It will be difficult to communicate through words the more subtle and complex feelings in my own experience when considering his character, the resonating intuition of a subconscious chord struck perfectly in my soul, those flashes of a sense of my own self being revealed to me in another, an unveiling of some of my shadow.
I indulge myself by refusing any pressure to write anything convincing, with needing to impress a professional or academic eye, or to even be entertaining. The primary aim is to help sort out my personal thoughts in my own process of self-discovery while inviting others along with me as I start writing more. The best we can offer is ourselves so I will strive towards authenticity.
However the housekeeping now needing to be addressed, the pink elephant being what may be simply another grandiose display of narcissism on the internet, yet another probably delusional person seeking glory in some immortal name beyond their insignificant selves. One can hardly scroll social media for five minutes without spotting a textbook case. Narcissism, a condition caused by trauma whereby the subject creates a delusion to escape to by imagining themselves much greater than they are. So many were apparently the greatest kings and heroes in a past life that the subject becomes too tiresome to offer attention to once again. And I have experienced trauma in my life, and can recognize some narcissistic tendencies in myself just as with all others, and rather than that being a condition of weakness in my half-hearted attempt to validate the thesis here, it actually serves to strengthen my capacity for accuracy and objectivity in self-reflection since being aware of the darkness of the mind, the lies, enables one to more properly discern the truth and light. Those unaware of their own capacity for darkness and lies are the ones more possessed by it.
With that said, my first impulsive idea that came to me was that I saw myself in him while peering at some pictures. Like I saw my own real self, something was telling me that was me, in his eyes. I wonder if a guide whispered in my ear reflecting on it. Being a very critical thinker, and doubtful of myself and all others, I questioned whether this was just emotional, psychological projection many times. A deeper part of me likes to think it is so much more though. The question is if it really is a past life, or parallel life as Bashar calls it. However in the end it does not matter. I simply enjoy this character very much because I see myself in him more than anyone else I have experienced. I even understand what seem to be inconsistencies in his character to others.
Poe expressed his deepest pleasure to Susan Talley saying she understood him completely, unlike almost everyone else. So hers is the next book I will read of him after just finishing Midnight Dreary by John Walsh who, in my opinion, delivered justice to the one hundred fifty year old mystery surrounding his death. It is an incredible book, very well-written and enjoyable to read. A real true crime detective adventure story about the death of the man who invented the detective mystery genre. (He also arguably started Sci-Fi too with his android story, wrote about an ether field of the universe in his monumental Eureka, invented the short story, and more.)
There are a few things that make me think of a deeper connection with him. When I was in grade school, I’m not sure when, something like Grade 1-4 maybe, I wrote a short story about a man named Eddy who died in a car crash. The story talked about him as a ghost and some other things I forget. (Too bad I didn’t keep those papers; I felt some pang of bad intuition while throwing them away.) That also reminds me in kindergarten I would draw pictures of beings with wispy ghost tails instead of legs, like from the Casper movie and I wonder if that was a bleed through memory of the spirit realm since I’ve heard of beings like that before, with serpent tails instead of legs. Anyways the interesting part is Poe’s nickname at home was Eddy. His beloved wife Virginia was Sissy, and her mother was Muddy.
Another time I recall around 18 at the library, I felt a strong desire to look up Edgar Allan Poe. So I did. Reading about him, not his stories, I really liked the character for some reason. Reading of how he liked to walk through the town at night made me imagine myself in a better time, more of my self I thought in a better world. There was something special about reading that, which stuck with me.
Though I never read much of his work, I believe my first introduction to him was The Simpson’s Raven episode. I loved that show. It resonated something deep within me when I watched as a child, so strongly.
An intriguing thing I must edit in to this piece, is we have the same hairline, a hairline I’ve seen in nobody else, except Lukas Rossi actually. It is not hair loss that makes his head look large in older photos, and I know this because I have the same thing. You can see in younger images of him the same phenomenon, where the front sides of his crown lack hair. For me, it never grew in there and I was very self conscious of it my whole childhood, and most of my life really. You can see his hair is still thick, but it just has that ‘balding look’ in some pictures, when really, it’s just the swept back hairline couple with a large forehead, just like me. I even wonder if it’s a hybrid thing, as Lukas is a hybrid too.
His wife Virginia looks exactly like my old girlfriend Kassandra did, and not just the images but other things. The resemblance in one portrait, as well as her deathly one really strikes a chord in me. She would sit with him and their cat as he wrote, just as we had our cats together. He taught her a lot, and I did to her. She died young and Kassandra told me she felt she knew she would, or was ‘supposed to’ die young. She also thought she was born in the wrong time and had an older, dignified 19th century air about herself as do I.
Virginia was very sick and one time coughed up blood while singing. At that time Edgar became quite dismayed and doubted her getting better. The ups and downs tortured him, of her seeming to get better, and then not. In a Cloud Atlas moment, I remembered Kassandra’s terrible experience after dental surgery. She was in so much pain and had a lot of blood in her mouth. The drugs lessened her inhibitions and she said she wanted to die in the moment though seemingly forgot the next day. At some level I felt a part of her spirit died when I saw her like that. And it did. She changed.
I believe I repeated a similar trauma from a past life with her. We do this even within our own lives where we attract experiences that open up the unhealed wounds of our own childhood so the conscious mind can heal them properly. The same thing happens with past lives. This, I believe is the main reason my conscious mind has been so attracted to Edgar Poe, as if there is trauma that needs to be addressed. I think such a traumatic life as Poe experienced, and the way he died is enough cause for such an intuition in a future incarnation.
When Edgar moved in with his wife, he moved in with her mother who was poor, so they lived with boarders to help cover their costs. The same situation happened with me when I moved in with Kassandra, they had room mates to help pay the bills, and it was overly crowded to say the least. Eventually we got the whole top floor to ourselves though for most of the time there, fortunately enough. Her mother also even looks like Maria Clemm, Virginia’s mother, in photographs that it really makes me wonder; they look so similar to me it is strange. Even one of the houses Poe lived with Virginia looked like the one I lived in with Kassandra for four years, the exact same white horizontal siding, a small square simple house with a single sloped roof, except the porch we had with the awning was at the back of the house rather than the front. We had cats that she loved more than anything. That’s just a small interesting thing only worth noting as I think synchronicities like this represent some connection at a nonlinear, spiritual level of reality. Maria was also his aunt who called him her son. In my own life, I was never close with my mother, but with my aunt whom I have always had a more motherly connection with. Virginia is also recorded as having quite the surprising defensive and assertive attitude towards some offenders in spite of her graceful, maidenlike personality, just like Kass too. One of her favourite movies, oddly enough, and mine as well, was Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, a story where lovers have their memories erased to ease the pain, and yet still find each other again.
There is also my strange attraction to the Romeo and Juliet story, which I was first exposed to as a young child by my three wicked step sisters who had a thing for pretty Leo of course in the modern retelling on film. It was a cool movie and resonated deeply with me so I always remembered it. I saw the play as a child too, and loved to read about it in school. You can even make an anagram of my last name into Romeo too which is also funny I guess. (My first name is also an annagram for ‘bard’, a title Poe glorifies in his poem Israfel, which is arguably my favourite I’ve read.) Poe also watched his mother play Shakespeare on stage as a toddler, though she died when he was only three years old. That was his first tragic loss of a beautiful woman, the most poetical of topics he would say. His mother certainly must have made a deep impression on his soul, performing on stage the most tragic Juliet, and then giving him the real living experience of such a horror.
Poe’s life reflected themes of Romeo and Juliet in a powerful way. His first love, Sarah Elmira Royster, was also his last. They were deeply in love and vowed to get married in their teens. She was fifteen and he was sixteen living as neighbours when they began their intense romance. Poe would sketch her beautifully with his pencil. A year later Poe was taking classes at the University of Virginia and would write to her. But unfortunately Sarah’s father would intercept all his letters and destroy them. It turns out he disapproved because Poe was a poor orphan who was not going to receive an inheritance from his cold-hearted adoptive father. Mr. Royster found this out and then deemed Poe unsuitable to wed his daughter. This is just like the Romeo and Juliet story where the female was too upper class for the poor lover. And there is also a woman I am casually aware of that has a striking resemblance to Elmira I’ve recently realized and it freaks me out. She has a strong reaction, and attraction to me as well.
Something interesting to consider in my case is the birth mark on my wedding ring finger, exactly where a jewelled ring would sit. They say birth marks often indicate a relation to how you died in a past life. When I was nineteen I spoke to a psychic and asked her for answers about this. Immediately she beheld a vision of flames and said that I had a stubborn, rebellious personality in a past life just as I do now, and in defiance of being unable to marry my love due to some class or social status issues, one being removed from the other, I burnt the ring into my finger! I did not know what to make of this at the time. About a dozen years later reading about Poe’s relationship made me wonder though.
And I must interrupt on that point, that last word, ‘though’. Poe wrote it a few times as tho’ in some of his Marginalia I’ve read, and in some of his famous poems. I’d never seen anyone else write it that way like I did. Actually I learned yesterday that Elmira Royster wrote it in a letter too, so I wonder if she got that from Poe or maybe it was common at the time, which is more likely. Anyhow, on a UFO forum where I made hundreds of posts, for some reason I shortened the word ‘though’ to ‘tho’’ countless times. I thought I was clever and unique, but it felt good to write it that way for some reason. That was almost fifteen years before I began musing about Poe’s life in relation to my own soul which began about two or three years ago, which I could check.
So yeah, the birth mark thing is intriguing. There is also a portrait of Poe done without a moustache, where he looks younger and healthier than in other depictions, my favourite image of him. People just love to see people in a dark light though, as unfortunate as that is… But I think it has a striking resemblance to myself from the right angle and expression.
Back to the Shakespearean tragedy. Elmira was also to be his last love as well. Skipping over the tragic death of his wife Virginia, and other romances, Poe travelled to offer the now-widowed, and wealthy Shelton his offer of marriage in 1849, the year of his death. She loved him more than anything as their forbidden childhood love was re-ignited. Poe was about to become a success in starting his own magazine The Stylus, which Elmira’s wealth would greatly assist in getting off the ground, and make a fairy-tale ending of his life of constant tragedy.
Edgar also wrote at length to another wealthy widow whom he proposed to marry not long before getting back together with Elmira, where he expressed with absolute sincerity his genuine love not being tied to money, which I believe in both cases.
However Elmira’s family did not approve of the marriage to put it lightly. They had heard rumours of Poe’s reputation with alcohol and women and felt he wanted to take advantage of her wealth. They also worried he would ruin her life with his imperfect history, I imagine starting in childhood with his father refusing to give him an inheritance and letting the nieghbouring Roysters become aware. Her family made it so that if the wedding did occur that Poe would not receive any of her inheritance, and Elmira would be getting a much smaller allowance from it as much more would go to the children, a price she would happily pay for the man she loved more than anything. To cut the story short, Elmira’s brothers were the main hand in Poe’s death. You can read Walsh’s book for the details. They assaulted him and forced whisky down his throat, in attempt to destroy his reputation, even alerting a local newspaper editor of Poe’s presence in a tavern after dropping him off their half conscious. Poe had taken a pledge after joining The Sons of Temperance for Elmira to prove his commitment to not drink. Having such a sensitive constitution, and signs of illness during his last week, the alcohol, (and maybe other drugs like opium which was commonley mixed in with whisky at the time) proved fatal for him. Elmira protected her brothers by not telling the whole truth about things and his death remained a mystery for many years. Most people were sadly happy believing he died in another pitiful episode of drunken debauchery, while others supposed he was a victim of ‘cooping’. There are other theories, but Walsh’s book really settles it in my mind. The brothers threatened him and refused to allow him to marry their sister which was the cause of his death. It was a very sad, tragic end, the glimmer of light to a tormented life cut short at the final step in the worst way; Orpheus had returned to Hades to retrieve his Eurydice, after calming all the demons with his song, only to lose her at the last step before returning to the light. (Orpheus reminds me of Israel too, an archetypal spirit in Poe’s and my own life.)
And likewise to him, I have a similar sensitive constitution to alcohol. Poe would go years without it, then indulge and create a terrible experience for himself and others. It was said a glass of wine would be enough to get him drunk. If I have a couple tall cans of beer I will be drunk, and a couple more is enough for me to lose some control in my exhilarated, joyous excitement. I imagine I understand how he was with it. I was exposed to alcohol and tempted by bad influences too much in my teens and would stay away from it for years at a time, only to fall back into the flippant act of spontaneous indulgence. Hangovers would be very brutal and it caused problems in my life. After years of not touching a drink, I decided to live a little at a work party which ended up very disastrous for me. Similarly with marijuana, I would stay away, then indulge and let it affect me in ways for the worse.
A big personal goal of mine in life is to strive for a very healthy and sober lifestyle, to not run from my painful feelings and stresses, but to heal them. I was born with a lot of unexplained pain and sadness which I now believe can be traced to past life trauma. People commented on my moodiness as a child. It has been the sole focus of my life, to heal this inner pain. More than money or status I wanted to feel whole and healthy. And I have made a lot of progress! Much more than I ever thought possible. Actually I thought much of it was related to my alien abduction history, but I think past life trauma explains a lot of it. The reason I prayed so much for answers about abductions was I thought it would help heal my hidden source of pain. This unexplained trauma was a main reason why I suspected most alien abductions were negative, but it turns out they’re not (huge topic I can explain at length another time). But I seemed to stumble on some hints and personal epiphanies regarding a possible past life, and if that is true, it would be an unexpected answer to my lifelong prayers for an explanation of ‘what is wrong with me, what is the source of all this insufferable pain?’. Time and a positive attitude, along with making the right choices truly does heal us, we only need faith to see ourselves through. (I also suspect Queen Anne of Britain, with her gout like mine, and other health problems, might be another one, contributing to my drive for perfect health and sobriety in this life, though there is little to go on for that one).
Something else on my mind to bring up, which I’d rather not, but I should consider all relevant data points as awkward as some may be in any investigation, is how Bill Murray looks like a clone of Edgar Allan Poe. And he probably is. I think this is the case with many celebrities since the Luciferian secret societies are into cloning and genetic experimentation and manipulation obviously. It’s almost as if some spirits can order their next bodysuits from a catalogue, picking people from history. However, I do not see the same soul in Bill Murray as the spirit that wrote like Poe. Even his eyes look small and less alive, while many commented on how striking Poe’s eyes are, and how great his dignified aura was felt in person. I saw a movie clip in Groundhog Day of Bill Murray walking, with such a stiff back. I’m told I have a unique, identifiable walk, and I have a bit of an awkward stiffness to it too. Seeing him walk seemed so strange to me, so odd, and it reminded me of myself.
There is more I’m probably forgetting. Though I have to mention as well how his poetry really struck a deep chord within me which is putting it mildly. And I don’t really like poetry much. I never read poetry. I love The Raven of course like any living human would. Some of his poems really tapped into a deep emotional part of my soul. Especially Annabel Lee which was about Elmira (as well as The Raven’s Lenore), and Eulalie which is most likely about his wife Virginia. They were very cathartic for me to read at a profound level, something that is difficult to communicate. And of course his writing style in general, the height of 19th century perfection, something that resonates so perfectly with how I imagine I should be, or could be, but more than that, my own true higher self. I feel that style and kind of consciousness reflects who I am at a deeper level. Something about it really just rings a bell that resonates so nicely, it makes me feel at home. Poe was considered a Romanticist and I totally vibe with what Wikipedia says about that. And so many other things about his personality from what I’ve read just mirrors that of my own self.
And who knows, maybe I’m just played by some demon, messing with my head, or mixing my aura with some disembodied etheric remains of the deceased poet. I doubt it though. I think spirit lead me to him to help me heal, because my main goal in life was this healing if I am honest with myself. And I do know my recent awakening to and conscious alignment with Christ has helped me maintain a safe grip on keeping my soul protected from the demons of the world. I was into music a lot for many years trying to process my deep and dark feelings, to put it mildly, as a screaming and wailing metalhead rocker that needs to turn it up to eleven. Studying EAP has a similar emotionally healing effect, if not more. And I do feel like more of a writer than a musician as it turns out.
Others have said there really is a strong resemblance of my visage compared with Poe, and I would agree. I just noticed his hair curls over the ear just like my hair did when I was younger. In some ways we look alike, in some ways not, but even as his mouth is described as not very nice looking, like myself when talking, but his other features are, like myself. And the ways he has been described, and stories… so many times I have been so keenly reminded of myself, and what I thought were quite unique peculiarities that I couldn’t list and recall everything. He was known for being very critical and making many enemies, just as myself. His profound melancholy, and bouts of sparkling enthusiasm, the intellectual genius which I have to some degree. I was actually tested as genius on a couple IQ tests, and when they did the Gifted testing for me in grade two, my mother was informed that my level was beyond a high school student’s and they could not measure it. So as dumb as I might appear to the less perceptive, I was born with an abnormally high intelligence, like Poe. I think the Trauma, and too much marijuana, occasional drinking, and especially the depressions over the years probably knocked my mental prowess down a few notches, but it’s still in there.
I have not done this subject justice. But I have done something, which is better than nothing, by sharing some of the thoughts stirring in me. It is a heavy subject very meaningful for me. I am totally open to being proven wrong, and have tried to let the topic go but it persists. In some ways I would prefer to stay quiet and not bother others with this knowing the kinds of judgments it invites. But, well, considering my first article about alien hybridization, surely nobody is going to pay much attention to me. Not anyone except probably a few souls guided by synchronicity who might resonate and understand a little more than the typical humaton. If anything, it certainly is interesting to consider. Being a hybrid, remembering a possible past life... I wanted answers my whole life, I desperately prayed, and sometimes we get them. Sometimes the mind’s intellect distorts the pure truth as it gently touches our souls. Though this is part of the fun of life, the novelty waiting to be discovered if we dare to peer into the darkness and ask questions.
