Edgar Allan Poe's Arc

Chapter 2 of 3

The rain would not stop, and the poem was already gone from the page. Poe knelt one last time beneath the willow. He read the ruined sheet aloud, fixing every word deeper in his mind. Then he gave up. He would not save this paper. He would go home and type the poem again from memory, before the lines slipped away like the ink had. Inside the cottage he sat at his writing desk. The raven rode his shoulder, still and cold. He held the wet sheet a moment longer. The last stanza was a gray smear now. He tossed it onto the pile of failed drafts beside the desk. Crumpled paper spread across the floor, each one a poem he had started and lost. He set his fingers on the typewriter keys and waited for the first line to come. A clatter rose outside before he could type. It started small, then swelled into a rush of wings and hard cries. Poe went to the tall window. Beyond the glass, the yard had turned black. Ravens covered the fence, the porch rail, the roof. A twisted autumn tree near the house sagged under them, every branch crowded with dark bodies. They pressed against the window, beaks tapping the panes. The sound was the same tapping his own bird made when it wanted feeding, but multiplied a hundred times. "You come for the poem I cannot keep," Poe said. "Then take the noise with you." He pulled his coat over his shoulders and went out onto the porch. The cold hit him at once. Wings beat the air on every side. He raised both arms and shouted. He clapped his hands hard and stamped the boards. "Away! Get away from here!" The birds nearest him lifted, screaming, then dropped back down a few feet off. They would not leave. They circled and settled again, closer than before. His own raven clung tight to his shoulder and did not fly to join them. Poe swung his arm at the twisted tree. A dozen birds rose in a black sheet, then folded back onto the branches. He kept shouting until his voice cracked. It changed nothing. The ravens only watched him with flat black eyes. Then the tapping stopped. The whole flock went silent at once. As one body they lifted from the fence and the roof and the tree. They swept low over Poe's head, so close he felt the wind of them. He ducked. When he looked up, the yard was empty. Not one bird remained. He stood alone in the rain, breathing hard. He had driven them off, or they had chosen to go. It did not matter which. His hands shook, and the poem in his head felt suddenly thin, as if the shouting had shaken loose a word. He hurried back inside to the desk before he could lose one more line.