The Passion of Edgar Allan Poe

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Colorized version of the ‘Annie daguerreotype.’
(May/June 1849, possibly commissioned by ‘Annie.’)

Edgar Allan Poe’s “For Annie” (1849) recounts a near-death experience that proved to be prophetic, in many ways, as to Poe’s actual death later that year. When Poe died on October 7, 1849, he spent the last couple of days of his life in apparent delirium, speaking incoherently, and “in great distress.” That state is certainly approximated in the “lingering illness” described in the poem, characterized by “moaning and groaning,” “sighing and sobbing,” “throbbing,” “nausea,” “thirst,” and a “fever/That maddened my brain.”

The resemblance to real life was not accidental; the poem is believed to be based on an actual episode in which a troubled Poe purposely overdosed on an opium preparation and nearly died. Not surprisingly, some have surmised that Poe’s real death came under similar circumstances, through another overdose of alcohol or some other substance—though the cause of his death 170 years ago remains thoroughly enshrouded in mystery and we take no stance here on what may have brought it about. But we can say that if a second overdose killed Poe, the earlier one assured his immortality by way of an enduring and memorable poem, an instant classic.

The piece is easily melodic, characterized by a light airiness in its verses, which are imbued with a spiritual quality. There is a certain disembodied quality to the first part of the poem, which sets up a “false death.” Poe comments on the disabling illness that beset him, but does so with a detachment that obeys too well Wordsworth’s Romantic idea of poetry as “emotion recollected in tranquility.” This aloofness approaches the quietude of a still-life:

And I rest so composedly, 
Now, in my bed, 
That any beholder 
Might fancy me dead

The false death goes beyond the appearance of death by bed-ridden immobility; it also has to do with an attitude of having passed on to a sort of afterlife: “the fever called 'Living'/Is conquered at last.” Poe also plants certain allusions evocative of a Christ-like suffering, he experiences “The torture of thirst,” and he craves the waters “Of Passion accurst.” He undergoes a sort of baptism, which is a death to a former life to obtain new life, drinking the “water that quenches all thirst.” He fancies himself festooned by various flowers and perfumed by the “holier odor” of “Puritan pansies.” Then he is cradled by an Angelic woman, in a profane (meaning secular) Pietà through which “the angels”—indeed, the “the queen of the angels”—will “shield” him “from harm.”

In this final part of the poem, we are no longer levitating above the seemingly dead patient, but we find ourselves fully incarnated in his flesh. The poem speaks of sensuality and carnality in turn to his nurse and Muse (the real Ms. Nancy Locke Heywood Richmond, who would later legally change her name to Poe’s pet name for her—Annie):

She tenderly kissed me, 
She fondly caressed, 
And then I fell gently 
To sleep on her breast

And just as we land back on earth, or at least on the convalescent bed, we turn our eyes heavenward, but only in the way mortals do, seeking protection from on high. Poe assures us that any semblance to death now is an illusion, because his lungs are filled with breath and life now; perhaps, baited breath for his Muse. Poe wants to live and prays for protection, much as on his deathbed his final words reportedly were “Lord, help my poor soul.”

Audio (poem):

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