"And earth, and stars, and sea, and sky
Are redolent of sleep as I
Am redolent of thee and thine
Enthralling love, my Adeline,
But list, O list,—so soft and low
Thy lover's voice to-night shall flow
That scarce awake thy soul shall deem
My words the music of a dream."
The lover in Assignation, in which To One in Paradise appeared then is Poe, and his dreamy character is in accordance with all the other self portrayals we have of the poet. The description of the Marchesa, no doubt, was inspired by Mary.
I think that the tale of Ligeia, which Poe considered his best story, was unconsciously inspired by Mary, and it hence calls for a new interpretation. It was published in September, 1838, two years after he married Virginia; but the poet's memories still hearken back to Mary. She is the dead Ligeia, and his wife, Virginia, is the Lady Rowena, whom the narrator married after Ligeia died. The story of Ligeia was suggested by a dream. The poem The Conqueror Worm did not originally appear in the body of the tale. The narrator's memory, we will recall, flew back to the dead Ligeia; he called her name in dreams; ever after Rowena was dead he had a thousand memories of Ligeia. The emphasis throughout the tale on the love for the departed Ligeia which will not die shows the real love the poet felt for Mary, about whom he was thinking. The narrator imagines that the dead Ligeia put a poison into the cup of his second wife, Lady Rowena, and that thus the latter dies. He then sinks into visions of Ligeia. He imagines that the corpse of his wife becomes alive, and as he looks at it, it is transformed into "my lost love" Ligeia. In other words, the dead love still lives and will not die; it is not forgotten, and haunts the poet, just as love for Mary haunted him. The quotation from Glanvil that man does not yield to death, applies as well to dead love.