3:77, #571: Ode to Melancholy Babies

While sitting in a tub of stress and tension salts,
I mused on Melancholy and other human faults,
No raven black came rapping, tapping on my chamber door,
A-quothing and a-croaking, "Never, Nevermore!"

But, thought I...Keats and Poe were rather quite neurotic.
The darkness in their souls gave thoughts that neared psychotic.
A Mideast Carpenter once implied, while speaking of 'the eye,'
When 'bad' its darkness overwhelms the soul which cannot die.

John and Edgar embraced the darkness in the soul.
They walked Vader's 'dark side,' never able to be whole.
Night's Plutonian shore they walked, enslaved to human evil.
Satan bored into their lives as to cotton thrusts the weevil.

Poe wrote that Gilead contained no healing balm,
"An artist must serve Mammon," Keats said without a qualm.
Said Carpenter has made the Way by offering His best.
"Come to Me, you heavy laden, and I will give you rest."

Sources:
Poe: "The Raven"
Keats: Letter to Percy B. Shelley, 8/16/1820
Photos: Wikipedia common domain