arrhymic rhymes in Hallowe’en time

under the copse
there is a corpse

behind the horse
there is a ghost

beneath my hats
resides a bat

next to the versed
awaits a curse

so this poor wretch
who loves a witch

shall carry on not
this Hallowe’en night

C L Couch

*(I recently read that trick-or-treating might have been a precursor and rehearsal, of sorts, for Christmas caroling. At this time of year, the Hallowe’en time, tenant farmers’ families went to the hall of the lord landowner—at which they sang and danced and performed illusions and other entertainments, all in the hope of receiving food from the landlord, because all were entering a time of year when there would be no more crops to harvest. At Christmas time, the same visitations happened for the same reason. The fall tenant traveling also timed, intentionally or coincidentally, with the Celtic festival Samhain—spelled with an m, the m pronounced as a w—a celebration of autumn and the food that could be harvested.)

Advertisement