Gather round my friends, as I share this haunting poem about my Halloween plight that is truly a fright. For you see this isn’t the first Halloween I’ve dreaded what horror would be unleashed by dressing me in a costume. So while I continue to search to find where Asa hid the one he picked out for me this year, please enjoy my version of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven.”

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, this is silly,

Over many a quaint and curious costume of forgotten Halloweens —

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came some laughing,

As of some one gently laughing, laughing at my garb.

“’Tis the TV,” I muttered, “laughing in my living room —            

Only this and nothing more.”

But the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of polyester wings,

Thrilled me — filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;   

So that now, to still the laughing, I stood repeating   

“’Tis some TV show Asa’s watching —

Some late night program entreating laughter in my living room; —

This it is and nothing more.”

Ah, distinctly I remember it is in the bleak October;

And each separate costume wrought its ghost upon the floor.   

Eagerly I wished them gone; — vainly I had sought to borrow   

From my friends’ better closets — garments without silly collars —

For the rare and radiant disguise which would make the children cry —

Frightening for evermore.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal dog ever dared to dream before;

Would I be a bug, a pumpkin, or perhaps a fluffy something, shaming me once more?

And the only word there spoken was the whispered words, “No More!”

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the words, “Encore!”

Merely this and nothing more.

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,

“Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is what is in store.   

Caught by my unruly mother whom unmerciful costumes don;   

Paraded around door to door ’til the laughter is abhorred —

Tell me why I must endure this melancholy burden once more, 

Of Halloween Costumes — “Nevermore!”

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,

“Mom, I cried, “thy costumes you hath made me

are not ghastly and a bore!”

“Dad,” said I, “truly your forgiveness I implore;

But the fact is people are all laughing — I will be a bug no more!”

Quoth the Golden, “Nevermore!”