REELY'S POETRY BLOG

Today marks the 91st year since the Bolsheviks executed Tsar Nicholas II and his entire family in Ekaterinburg, Russia, but did you know that the Tsar and his family are saints of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad and passion bearers of the Russian Orthodox Church?

This is a somewhat complicated matter, since their canonization was based upon their being victims of Soviet oppression. Many others who were murdered along with the Royal Family on that awful day were also canonized, as well as relatives of the royals and servants of the relatives who were killed in the days that followed. The killings were still going on in September.

There is a wealth of information, including miracles attributed to Nicholas II, here:

The Royal Martyrs of Russia

Ah, another day … another historical murder, and another poem on the topic. This one is by English clergyman and author, William James Dawson, (1854-1928), who obviously wasn’t at the execution of Mme. Corday for the murder of Jean-Paul Marat in 1793, but Dawson seeks to reproduce the emotions of Adam Lux, who was:

Adam Lux to Charlotte Corday

Red is the garb thou wearest, red is the deed thou hast done,
And red on a land of blood rises the morning sun.
Kings have ridden this road, conquerors mailed in gold,
But none in such red triumph as this that we behold.

Rose, thro’ a rose-red dawn, go to thy valourous fate,
Queen of all roses thou, splendid and passionate.
And lo ! at thy feet I fling, here, in the gallows-cart,
Passionate even as thine, the rose-flower of my heart.
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Oh Burr, oh Burr, what has though done,
Thou has shooted dead great Hamilton!
You hid behind a bunch of thistle,
And shooted him dead with a great hoss pistol!

It’s been said that this anonymous poem addressed to Aaron Burr was left on Burr’s doorstep in 1804, while other reports say that Burr never saw it until many years later. Whichever, Burr really didn’t hide “behind a bunch of thistle.”

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On today’s date in 1850, the 12th President of the United States, Zachary Taylor (known by the nickname “Ol’ Rough and Ready), died of gastroenteritis, after serving for 16 months. At the time, only William Henry Harrison had served a shorter time, dying a month after taking office.

Commemorating the occasion of his death, the Prosecuting Attorney of Logan County, Ohio, William Hubbard, penned these lines:

ZACHARY TAYLOR

Not where the spicy breezes
Of a tropic climate fann’d,
The star-illumined banner
Of the hero’s idol-land:
Not in the storm of battle,
Where the bayonet gleamed high,
‘Mid the drum and trumpet’s clangor
Was the patriot to die!

When the cannon stilled its thunder,
When the saber hid its sheen,
When the turf by blood encrimsoned
Reassumed its garb of green:
When the worn and weary soldier
Laid his plume and helmet by,
And the battle-horse unharnessed
Paled the lightning of his eye;
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When I think of the poem El Dorado, I always get a mental picture of Edgar Allan Poe saying “what rhymes with knight?” and then he finds the word “bedight” and hollers “Eureka.” Then he says, hey, that’s a good title and saves up “Eureka” for later use.

Maybe he thought it was weird that the Spanish explorers were always “dressed to the nines” while conducting their explorations. Don’t think he didn’t know that expression since it appears in one of Robert Burns’ works – The Poem on Pastoral Poetry:

“Thou paints auld Nature to the nines,
In thy sweet Caledonian lines; …”

Our gallant knight isn’t just “gaily bedight” when he sets out. He is gaily bedight “in sunshine and in shadow.” I have always pictured him alone, though most of the searches for the fabled South American City of Gold were actually expeditions.

The legend of El Dorado actually grew from several stories. One involves “el indio dorado,” (the Golden Indian). This is a tale about Diego de Ordaz’s lieutenant Martinez, who was rescued from a shipwreck, and taken from town to town. Supposedly, he was entertained by a Golden Indian. However, Prussian naturalist and explorer, Alexander von Humboldt notes in his book, Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, that he believes this fable was based loosely upon the adventures of Juan Martin de Albujar, who “fell into the hands of the Caribs of the Lower Orinoco. This Albujar married an Indian woman and became a savage himself.”

Conquistador Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada (it is believed that Miguel de Cervantes modeled Don Quixotes after him) searched for El Dorado, but instead found the Muisca, one of the most advanced pre-Colombian civilizations. The invading Spaniards took gold and emeralds galore and stole the golden ornaments from the temple at Sogamoso. Then they burned down the temple. On August 6, 1538, the Muisca village of Bacatá was renamed Santa Fé de Bogotá.

Later in 1541, Gonzalo Pizarro who was the governor of Quito, as well as half brother of Francisco Pizarro, teamed up with Francisco de Orellana to set out in search of El Dorado. Pizarro quit the disastrous expedition. Orellana ended up being the first to travel and explore the entire length of the Amazon River.

Sir Walter Raleigh (who was pretty gaily bedight himself) resumed the search in 1595 and upon his return to England, published a book describing El Dorado as a city on Lake Parima far up the Orinoco in Guiana (modern-day Venezuela). This city was marked on English and other maps until its existence was disproved by Alexander von Humboldt.

Perhaps Poe was reading von Humboldt when he conceived the idea for El Dorado. Perhaps Poe even met von Humboldt during the period of time that he stayed with French author Alexandre Dumas in Paris, although that Poe ever even stayed in Paris is disputed. What can’t be disputed is that Poe dedicated his last great work, Eureka: A Prose Poem, to Alexander von Humboldt.

Our Poe pages so far
El Dorado
A Dream Within a Dream
The Bells
Annabel Lee

More links:
The Purloined Life of Edgar Allan Poe