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Remarkable Spiritual Poem.
The following striking poem was recited by Miss Lizzie Doten, a Spiritual trance speaker, at the close of a recent lecture in Boston. She professed to give it impromptu, so far as she was concerned, and to speak under the direct influence of the spirit of Edgar A. Poe. Whatever may be the truth about its production, the poem is in several respects a remarkable one. Miss Doten is apparently incapable of originating such a poem. If it was written for her by some one else, and merely committed to memory and recited by her, the poem is nevertheless wonderful as a reproduction of the singular music and alliteration of Poe's style, and as manifesting the same intensity of feeling. Whoever wrote the poem must have been exceedingly familiar with Poe and deeply in sympathy with his spirit. But if Miss Doten is honest, and the poem originated as she says it did, it is unquestionably the most astonishing thing that Spiritualism has produced. It does not follow necessarily, in that case, that Poe himself made the poem — although we are asked to believe a great many spiritual things on less cogent evidence — but it is in any view of it that may be taken, a very singular and mysterious production. There is in the second verse an allusion to a previous poem that purported to come from the spirit of Poe, which was published several years since, and attracted much attention, but the following is of a higher order and much more like Poe poem than the other: —
From the throne of life eternal,
From the home of love supernal,
Where the angel feet make music over all the starry floor —
Mortals, I have come to meet you,
Come with words of peace to greet you,
And to tell you of the glory that is mine forevermore.
Once before found mortal
Waiting at the heavenly portal —
Waiting but to catch some echo from that ever-opening door;
Then I seized his quickened being,
And through all his inward seeing,
Caused my burning inspiration in a fiery flood to pour!
Now I come more meekly human,
And the weak lips of a woman
Touch with fire from off the altar, not with burnings as of yore,
But in holy love descending,
With her chastened being blending,
I would fill your souls with music from the bright celestial shore.
As one heart yearns for another,
As a child turns to its mother,
From the golden gates of glory turn I to the earth once more,
Where I drained the cup of sadness,
Where my soul was stung to madness,
And life's bitter, burning billows swept my burdened being o’er.
Here the harpies and the ravens,
Human vampyres — sordid cravens,
Preyed upon my soul and substance till I writhed in anguish sore;
Life and I then seemed mismated,
For I felt accursed and fated,
Like a restless, wrathful spirit, wandering on the Stygian shore.
Tortured by a nameless yearning,
Like a frost-tire, freezing, burning,
Did the purple, pulsing life-tide through its fevered channels pour,
Till the golden bowl-Life's token —
Into shining shards was broken,
And my chained and chafing spirit leapt from out its prison door.
But while living, striving, dying,
Never did my soul cease crying:
“Ye who guide the fates and furies, give! oh, give me, I implore,
From the myriad hosts of nations —
From the countless constellations,
One pure spirit that can love me — one that I, too, can adore!”
Through my this fainting fervent aspiration,
Found my fainting soul salvation,
For, from out its blackened fire-crypts, did my quickened spirit soar;
And my beautiful ideal —
Not too saintly to be real —
Burst more brightly on my vision than the fancy-formed Lenore.
‘Mid the surging seas she found me,
With the billows breaking round me,
And my saddened, sinking spirit, in her arms of love upbore;
Like a lone one, weak and weary,
Wandering in the midnight dreary,
On her sinless, saintly bosom brought me to the heavenly shore.
Like the breath of blossoms blending,
Like the prayers of saints ascending,
Like the the [[sic]] rainbow's seven-hued glory, blend our souls forevermore.
Earthly love and lust enslaved me,
But divinest love hath saved me,
And I know now, first and only, how to love and to adore.
Oh, my mortal friends and brothers,
We are each and all another's,
And the soul that gives most freely from its treasure, hath the more.
Would you lose your life, you find it;
And in giving love, you bind it
Like an amulet of safety, to your heart forevermore!
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Notes:
This poem was eventually granted the title of “Resurrexi.” It was widely reprinted in various newspapers at the time, and over subsequent years.
The claim that it was received from Poe, on the “other side,” is largely a matter of personal belief, but the idea that it compares favorably to his best poems hardly stands up to scrutiny. The body of poetry supposedly received from Poe's spirit is large, but rarely strays beyond poor imitations of “The Raven” or “Ulalume.”
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[S:0 - SDR, 1860] - Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore - A Poe Bookshelf - Remarkable Spiritual Poem (Lizzie Doten, 1860)