Poe lives - in Honolulu
I used to read the "Big Reel" magazine some years ago - a periodical devoted to collectors of movie memorabilia and 16/35mm film prints. Standing out among the ads were the expressions of a sad-looking man with a craggy, Walter Matthau-esque face - a poet, songwriter, dreamer.
His name was Herbert Yuen. In his mind he was Edgar Allan Poe, Indiana Jones, silent screen star John Gilbert, and "Elisha Rosanova."
Yuen fancied himself Hawaii's answer to Poe - he set up a shrine to the brooding bard of Baltimore, in his own "House of Usher."
And he shared with Big Reel readers his poems as the "Edgar Allen (sic) Poe of Hawaii":
The Hill of San Juan
Just a hill of San Juan?
No! 'Tis bristlin' with Spanish guns
An' cannons from row to row
They sparkle like a thousand guns
That I know - I am there, I know,
You can't see their weapons
Because they've no flame -
Clever, them Latin villains.
A Conundrum
I myself have no home
Nor family nor anyone
'Tis better to dwell round boirbe*
Than take up space with someone,
No wife, bairns nor pets
Yea - so easier a soul forgets
Freer to roam with no home
No belongings, no worries,
No money, my roof the sky.
Who am I?
*Fri., Mud (Yuen's footnote. Perhaps by "Fri" he meant "Fr." for French. But "boirbe" is an Irish word meaning "aggression" or "violence." The French for mud is "boue".)
The Ruin by the Sea
Who lives yon in the Cimmerian ruin --
The moldering ruin by the sea?
Where echo unearthly voices there
With the moanings across the lea
With the groanings of the wind swept tree.
The bat wots (?) - it will tell
At the stroke of the midnight bell
When all the shades come to jell
At the jar of the midnight bell.
Which then the sea imps come
Trailing along in their wet- gray shrouds--
Trailing and regaling to the beat of the surf
Beneath the high and the darksome clouds
Amid the cry of the shadow in crowds :
They are the phantoms that haunt about
Midst their happy grinning shout
To revel within and without
With their cronies the sea-imps about.
Aye! they revel among the gravel
They come far from Azrael --
Their souls bereft by the angel
As they travel among the gravel.
'Tis they who dwelt in the Cimmerian ruin --
The moldering ruin by the sea
Where echo unearthly voices there
With the groanings of the wind swept tree
With the moanings across the lea.
Excerpts from other Yuen ads:
"Just Out - A book of various music by Herbert Yuen - 'The Edward MacDowell of Today' - $10 ea. Very lovely songs."
"JOHN GILBERT IS ALIVE! Herbert Yuen is John in the new version of 'Masks of the Dead' (Entertainment only)."
"'The Garson' (Turk, waiter), starring Errol Flynn as the villain, lovely almond eyed Debra Winger, and Yuen himself as the hero. Movie script by him, $3/copy."
[never mind the fact that Flynn died some two decades before Winger made her film debut]
Somewhere, a raven looked on and smiled...
His name was Herbert Yuen. In his mind he was Edgar Allan Poe, Indiana Jones, silent screen star John Gilbert, and "Elisha Rosanova."
Yuen fancied himself Hawaii's answer to Poe - he set up a shrine to the brooding bard of Baltimore, in his own "House of Usher."
And he shared with Big Reel readers his poems as the "Edgar Allen (sic) Poe of Hawaii":
The Hill of San Juan
Just a hill of San Juan?
No! 'Tis bristlin' with Spanish guns
An' cannons from row to row
They sparkle like a thousand guns
That I know - I am there, I know,
You can't see their weapons
Because they've no flame -
Clever, them Latin villains.
A Conundrum
I myself have no home
Nor family nor anyone
'Tis better to dwell round boirbe*
Than take up space with someone,
No wife, bairns nor pets
Yea - so easier a soul forgets
Freer to roam with no home
No belongings, no worries,
No money, my roof the sky.
Who am I?
*Fri., Mud (Yuen's footnote. Perhaps by "Fri" he meant "Fr." for French. But "boirbe" is an Irish word meaning "aggression" or "violence." The French for mud is "boue".)
The Ruin by the Sea
Who lives yon in the Cimmerian ruin --
The moldering ruin by the sea?
Where echo unearthly voices there
With the moanings across the lea
With the groanings of the wind swept tree.
The bat wots (?) - it will tell
At the stroke of the midnight bell
When all the shades come to jell
At the jar of the midnight bell.
Which then the sea imps come
Trailing along in their wet- gray shrouds--
Trailing and regaling to the beat of the surf
Beneath the high and the darksome clouds
Amid the cry of the shadow in crowds :
They are the phantoms that haunt about
Midst their happy grinning shout
To revel within and without
With their cronies the sea-imps about.
Aye! they revel among the gravel
They come far from Azrael --
Their souls bereft by the angel
As they travel among the gravel.
'Tis they who dwelt in the Cimmerian ruin --
The moldering ruin by the sea
Where echo unearthly voices there
With the groanings of the wind swept tree
With the moanings across the lea.
Excerpts from other Yuen ads:
"Just Out - A book of various music by Herbert Yuen - 'The Edward MacDowell of Today' - $10 ea. Very lovely songs."
"JOHN GILBERT IS ALIVE! Herbert Yuen is John in the new version of 'Masks of the Dead' (Entertainment only)."
"'The Garson' (Turk, waiter), starring Errol Flynn as the villain, lovely almond eyed Debra Winger, and Yuen himself as the hero. Movie script by him, $3/copy."
[never mind the fact that Flynn died some two decades before Winger made her film debut]
Somewhere, a raven looked on and smiled...
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