Hear Us Out: Fuck Baltimore, Edgar Allen Poe Would Have Been A Red Sox Fan

To you, the name Edgar Allen Poe might conjure three things: the Raven-black hair, the mustache, and of course, the macabre and lamp-lit streets of Baltimore. But what if I told you, although Poe spent his latter life in the City of Charm and thus frequently referenced it in his works, he was not, as it were, an Orioles fan? What if I told you instead that the illustrious Poe had more Red in him than that same Masque of Death that bore the name?

I first fell upon Poe’s suspect allegiance during my time as a young stowaway upon the dreary whaling ship, Grampus. It was there I spent my uneventful days idling amongst the benevolent midshipmen who, in brief respites abutting the ceaseless tempests tossing us to and fro, made it known to me over butts of soured wine that Poe was birthed a young Boston cur, and insisted that every bone of his pallid body yearned only for that shrouded, foreboding city.

Upon returning to land, I resolved to sail nevermore, and immediately struck out to reveal Poe’s alleged affinity. It was dead of night, and although my aghast eyes could barely reveal the path ahead of me, I could spy a presence very near my person, lingering in those stretched, crawling shadows wherein the light from the Dunkin Donuts penetrates through chary slits in the dark, towering maples lining the Commons. The figure was shrouded, quite girthy, and appeared to be pointing a large, solid object in its outstretched hand to somewhere behind me.

The boys on the Grampus had warned me of an apparition, long forgotten but believed in Poe’s time to be not only real, but the mark of perpetual Loss upon any who witnessed it. I ran to get closer to the phantasm, but in my haste, I tumbled and sprawled upon an upturned stone in my path, narrowly avoiding what appeared to be a deep pit, only to spy the words scratched deep in the earth:

B-A-M-B-I-N-O

Surely Poe did not believe such rumours? I laughed to myself, perhaps louder than necessary, perhaps in show to whatever was looming in my periphery that I did not give credence to the forlorn talk of superstitious sailors. But, fool that I am, I should have remained silent.

For as soon as I laughed, an anomalous creature emerged that made me sure of Poe’s allegiance—not out of hometown affinity, mind you, but fear, I now understood; fear of a silent madness which would entrap all men if they, like me, did not believe; fear of that haunted spirit that bounded towards me now, sock bloodied, wrapping me in its embrace.

As we plummeted headlong into the pit, all I could hear was his hoary whisper:

“When you die,” it said, with a sadness I could never forget, “I will be the last of the old, old franchise—the House of Bambino.”