Virginia gradually grew worse and finally died at their home at Fordham, near New York.  After this sad event Poe wrote a poem which is a sort of requiem for her death.  It was not published during his life, but after his death it appeared in the New York Tribune.  Immediately it took rank as one of the three greatest poems Poe ever wrote.  It is long enough to be complete, it has none of those metrical imperfections found in his earlier poems, and it possesses in a wonderful degree that haunting thrill so characteristic of all the best things Poe wrote.  Moreover, it has a musical flow surpassing any other of Poe’s poems except “The Bells,” and in some respects it is even more pleasing to the ear when read aloud than is “The Bells.”

ANNABEL LEE.

  It was many and many a year ago,
    In a kingdom by the sea,
  That a maiden there lived whom you may know
    By the name of Annabel Lee;
  And this maiden she lived with no other thought
    Than to love and be loved by me.

  I was a child and she was a child,
    In this kingdom by the sea: 
  But we loved with a love that was more than love,—­
    I and my Annabel Lee;
  With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
    Coveted her and me.

  And this was the reason that, long ago,
    In this kingdom by the sea,
  A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
    My beautiful Annabel Lee;
  So that her highborn kinsmen came
    And bore her away from me,
  To shut her up in a sepulcher
    In this kingdom by the sea.

  The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
    Went envying her and me,—­
  Yes!—­that was the reason (as all men know,
    In this kingdom by the sea)
  That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
    Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

  But our love it was stronger by far than the love
    Of those who were older than we,—­
  Of many far wiser than we;
    And neither the angels in heaven above,
    Nor the demons down under the sea,
  Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
    Of the beautiful Annabel Lee: 

  For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
    Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
  And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
    Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
  And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
  Of my darling—­my darling—­my life and my bride,
    In the sepulcher there by the sea,
    In her tomb by the sounding sea.

CHAPTER IX

POE’S LITERARY HISTORY

As assistant editor of the Southern Literary Messenger, Poe achieved great literary success.  In this paper he began those spirited criticisms of the writers of the day, which attracted attention everywhere.  He also published numerous stories.  Poetry was almost completely abandoned for prose.