Last week The Cricket published, “Some Thoughts on Our Pandemic,” submitted by Harry Hull III. Well, in April, 1958 Hull, then 13, had another poem, “The Moor” published as an English 8a student at Manchester Elementary School. The style is clearly inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Raven,” which Hull said he must have been studying. Hull’s teacher was Alice Chorebanian (later Mrs. Alice Magoon), who gave the poem an A and asked for a copy to send to The Cricket, where it was published. “I consider Manchester one of my spiritual homes, and it will always have a big place in my heart,” wrote Hull, who lives in Santa Fe, NM. “I particularly miss daily walks on Singing Beach.“
By Harry Hull III
When the night is gloomy
And the moon is obscure,
When a soft rustling wind
Steals over the moor,
No one dares venture
Where dead ones once stood.
No one dares venture from his neighborhood.
But hark! What’s that noise
That comes from the moor?
For all [who] have been there
Come back no more.
Who breaks the heather
Where dead ones once stood?
Who dares venture from his neighborhood?
There’s a curse, they say,
On that awful, ghostly spot.
And you can hear children’s parents
Say to their lot:
“Never go down and play on the moor.
For your grandfather did
And came back no more.”
A blood-curdling scream breaks over the moor. A scream, a sigh as others before.
That curious soul will breathe no more.
For when the night is gloomy
And the moon is obscure,
When a soft rustling wind
Steals over the moor,
No one dares venture
Where dead ones once stood.
No one dares venture from his neighborhood.
