EULALIE (Page 29)
Published in 1845 with the subtitle, "A Song."
19. Astarte. See note on line 37 of "Ulalume," page 189.
TO M.L. S——- (Page 30)
Published March 13, 1847, and addressed to Mrs. Marie Louise Shew, who had been a veritable angel of mercy in the Poe home. She relieved the poverty and helped to care for Virginia (who died January 29), and afterward nursed Poe himself during his severe illness. Mrs. Shew had had some medical training and probably saved Poe's life. This brief poem is instinct with a gratitude and reverence easy to understand, and is, for Poe, unusually spontaneous.
ULALUME (Page 30)
Published in December, 1847, and in January, 1848. The earlier form contained an additional stanza, afterward wisely omitted. Read the comment on the poem in the Introduction, pages xxiv-xxv.
5. Immemorial: properly means extending indefinitely into the past. Poe may mean that the year has seemed endless to him, but apparently he uses the word in the sense of memorable.
6, 7. Auber rhymes with October, Weir with year; the names were coined by Poe for rhyme and tone color. Note the resemblance of "Weir" to "weird."
8. tarn: a small mountain lake. It is used provincially in England to mean a boggy or marshy tract. Poe used the word to signify a dark, stagnant pool. Cf. "The Fall of the House of Usher," page 49.