Blog Post #1
“I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea,
But we loved with a love that was more than love—
I and my Annabel Lee—
With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsmen came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.”
-Edgar Allan Poe
This nearly hypnotic rhythm has always reminded me of a tragic fairy tale, and the meticulously beautiful diction is one of the best representations of true love I’ve ever seen. This poem breaks my heart and gives me hope all in the same breath, as do many things written by Edgar Allan Poe. The repeated metaphor in the first line of this stanza gives it an overwhelming tone of innocence, especially when followed by the metaphor in the next line, “in this kingdom by the sea”. They seem like children at play, which makes the end of their story all the more troubling. The next line has always been one of my favorite lines ever written, because it makes no sense and so much sense at the same time. Not only does the repetition of the word love have such an alluring sound, but it reinforces how much Poe cannot even fathom his love for this girl. When he then says, “my Annabel Lee”, it sounds much more like an expression of his appreciation for her than his possession of her because of the preceding line, underlining the depths of their love. His concluding two lines are entirely contradictory; the first uses the only real adjective in this stanza, bringing up strong images of angels and heaven and goodness. However, the next states that these figures of divinity were jealous of the love they shared, which is considered a sin, making it seem all the more precious and pure. This contradiction is representative of the contradiction of their situation: these two were given such a magical, wonderful thing, and then she just died and it was all over. This contradiction shows how little sense Poe sees in this, and he uses the next stanza to try to make sense of it. He shows this by repeating the line, “In this kingdom by the sea”, because he’s juxtaposing that image of childhood innocence with Annabel Lee’s fate. His next lines reinforce this as well, because he is still using these images that are associated with the heavens, but casting them in such a terrible light. This is continued when he personifies her “highborn kinsmen”, likening her to angels while his use of the word “bore” makes them seem almost like monsters. That monstrosity is most prevalent in the last two lines, again because of the contradiction in them. “Shut her up in a sepulchre” sounds so violent and wrong, yet it is the angels who are doing so. The next repetition of the line, “In this kingdom by the sea”, ends these stanzas with that image of childhood innocence again, because their love is that pure, and the purpose of this poem is to show that. These contradictory images and ideas are juxtaposed so explicitly to show the depths of Poe’s distress at what happened, because he cannot make sense of it. There is no other explanation for such a good thing to be ruined, to him, than for it to be too good to exist in this world. We can’t have goodness beyond our figures of divinity, of utmost purity. However, this is earth-shattering, because why would anything good want to destroy another good thing? This blurring of the line between good and evil is always something that irks me, something I attribute to the black-and-white morale of my all-time favorite book series, Harry Potter. Paired with the undying love represented in this poem and the tragedy associated with it, these stanzas especially have always resonated with me, because they’ve made me feel so many different ways at once, and I feel differently each time I read them. There is so much personality and honesty and feeling in these words, and they are so carefully arranged as to not misrepresent the goodness of the one thing that remains pure as can be through this poem, his beautiful Annabel Lee. This is good writing.
