I think I’ve put my finger on it.
Living in Poe’s word-world has felt to me like being in a dream. Wait. Let me try again. It is more accurate to say it has begun to feel less and less like a world that could have ever really existed…for anyone but for him. Poe said in an article the year he died, “It is by no means an irrational fancy that, in a future existence, we shall look upon what we think our present existence, as a dream.” (Or as he wrote in the poem from the last blog – is all that we see or seem, but a dream within a dream?)
Lots of dreaming in the last few days, for I have had the pleasure now of hearing all of this music together, in performance order, one poem after another. All set to music by a great variety of composers, each taking Poe’s (old) words creating some new thing… I wish I could describe this to you. I can’t. You have to come hear it for yourself – it’s just too hard to explain. Maybe I’ll leave it to Poe to do that. Here is one last poem to read for you “Israfel” it’s about an angel.
Anyway, the last rehearsal is well over, and everyone is getting ready, which I should be doing.