The Horror Tales of the Greats

He slipped on a set of headphones,

Adjusted a dial or two,

Then introduced his radio show

And the members of his crew,

‘The Horror Tales of the Greats’ he read

Each week to the folk in town,

Just as the Moon was coming up

With the sun then truly down.

 

And the folk had huddled round speakers

To hear, in a thousand homes,

The tales of Edgar Allan Poe

In the speaker’s crackling tones,

And an eerie mist fell over the town

If they chanced to look outside,

As the ghosts of horror stories past

Rose up from the place they died.

 

Each tone was sent with a shiver

From the night’s Plutonian shore,

Just as that stately bird of old

Had repeated, ‘Nevermore!’

While the cats had yowled in the alleyways

When he read a tale of sin,

Of walling up the corpse of his wife

When the Black Cat did him in.

 

The Fall of the House of Usher,

The Masque of the Red Death,

The tales built up in the atmosphere

And made them short of breath,

The Cask of Amontillado,

The Pendulum and the Pit,

Whatever the horror, and most intense

There was always more of it.

 

The stars that shone in the evening sky

Had gone, though the sky was clear

As the Moon had dropped down, over a hill

While the airwaves dripped with fear,

And the walls back there, in the studio

Were seeming to seep a flood,

As the speaker droned in the microphone

The studio filled with blood.

 

And suddenly then, a different voice

Was heard all over the town,

Rattling through their radio’s

And shouting the reader down.

‘Shutter your windows and lock your doors

Put children under the bed,

Hide yourselves right under the stairs

Or you may well end up dead!’

 

‘The very air that you breathe has been

Long saturated with dread,

Has filled your lungs with the ripe unclean

That came from somebody’s head.

The ghostly voice on your radio

That has whispered blood and gore,

Will drown tonight in the studio

So there won’t be any more.’

 

And right behind that terrible voice

There was choking sounds and screams,

Enough to curdle the very blood

And to give them nightmare dreams,

Then after a long, chilled silence of

The type that terror sates,

A voice said, ‘that was the final of

The Horror Tales of the Greats.’

 

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[R Smith]

its a catastrophy David, bring back that radio show, I remember when i was a kid, we sat round the radio on a Sunday night to hear Journey into Space and the like, such a lovely memory that is, this is one of my favourites of yours, I love that trilogy of Poe, Corman, Price movies and the writing of Poe is my love of all time and you used my favourite word ever since The Raven came into my life, 'Nevermore' if i can throw that into a poem i will lol, marvelous David, just marvelous :)

[Carlos Lorenzo Estrada]

This was an enjoyable haunting poem to read. A throw back to the day of old when radio supplied the masses with entertainment and imagination. Thank you for sharing your art.

[andrew mitchell]

a good horror ghostly yarn told with perfection . thanks for sharing

[MomzillaNC]

I can almost see Poe himself smiling over your denouement! I hear John Barrymore in the radio announcer's voice and Vincent Price in the narrator's. Absolutely brilliant!

[Marie]

I read with interest what ANTO said about Vincent Price speaking the final lines of this poem, and I agree; that would be good. But even better would be to hear David Lewis Paget saying 'that was the final of He Horror Tales of the Greats.'

[Valentine]

Wooo, now I may not sleep tonight. This was really good. Your rhyming was spot on and your story line right on all through the write. One of your better tales. Valentine

[ANTO]

The guy was unknowingly sowing the seeds of his own demise with his scary tales and like a moth to a flame he attracted the last 'fan' he'd ever meet. Well penned David.

"...silence of The type that terror states,.." - brilliant - I saw Vincent Price speaking the final lines in that 'Theatre of Blood' style of his and Im glad I read this at 5pm and not at 1 am.
Superb DLP - as always my friend. God Bless.

[Satan]

I can really appreciate this one :)