POE: The Raven (2021)

Summary

Podcast Summary: Full Body Chills – Episode "POE: The Raven" (2021)

Introduction

"POE: The Raven," an episode from Season 6 of the horror anthology podcast Full Body Chills, delves into the dark and haunting themes inspired by Edgar Allan Poe's legendary poem, "The Raven." Released on November 5, 2024, this episode masterfully intertwines themes of grief, loss, and the supernatural, offering listeners a chilling narrative that resonates with Poe's original work while adding modern psychological layers.

Characters and Narration

The episode features a primary character known as the Grieving Partner, portrayed through a deep and emotive narration by Jake Weber. Additionally, the episode includes voiceovers by Jake Weber and Edgar Allan Poe to provide context and literary depth. The Raven itself becomes a pivotal character, embodying the protagonist's torment and serving as a symbol of unending sorrow.

Plot Summary

The story centers around a man mourning the untimely death of his beloved, Lenore, who perished in a car crash caused by a drunk college student. Three years after the tragedy, the protagonist resides alone in a secluded cabin near Lake Champlain in Vermont, immersed in memories of Lenore and struggling to move forward.

Seeking solace and a means to reconnect with his lost love, the protagonist turns to psilocybin mushrooms, recalling the mystical experiences he once shared with Lenore. During a solitary psychedelic trip, he experiences vivid hallucinations and confronts his deepest fears and regrets.

As the effects of the psilocybin intensify, the protagonist senses an ominous presence. He hears a faint tapping at the door, which escalates into a terrifying encounter with a black raven. The bird's piercing gaze and its repetitive utterance of the word "Nevermore" (00:02:36) become the focal point of his psychological unraveling.

Throughout the night, the raven's presence forces the protagonist to confront the permanence of death and his inability to overcome his grief. The bird's haunting repetition serves as a constant reminder that Lenore will never return, encapsulating the essence of his despair.

Key Themes and Discussions

1. Grief and Loss: The central theme revolves around the protagonist's inability to accept Lenore's death. His isolation exacerbates his grief, making it nearly impossible for him to find closure or move on.

   "The measure of love loss?" (00:02:36) – Grieving Partner

2. Supernatural Symbolism: The raven symbolizes the inescapable nature of mourning and serves as a manifestation of the protagonist's internal anguish. Its presence blurs the lines between reality and hallucination, emphasizing the torment of unresolved grief.

   "Nevermore." (00:16:54) – Raven

3. Psychedelic Journeys and Mental Health: The use of psilocybin as a means to cope with grief highlights the complexities of using substances for emotional healing. The protagonist's experience underscores the potential dangers of solitary psychedelic use without guidance.

   "It's important to lean into a psychedelic experience." (00:07:18) – Grieving Partner

4. Isolation vs. Connection: The protagonist's seclusion in the cabin represents his withdrawal from society, while his yearning to reconnect with Lenore illustrates the human need for connection, even in the face of loss.

Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Grieving Partner [02:36]: "Why is the measure of love loss?"
  Reflects the protagonist's contemplation of what constitutes love and the depths of his sorrow.

• Raven [15:23]: "It was the smell of her skin in the morning, the smell of her neck."
  Suggests a sensory connection to Lenore, blurring the lines between reality and hallucination.

• Raven [16:54]: "A sound came up in me, a protest from somewhere primitive, a primordial scream."
  Illustrates the protagonist's primal fear and instinctual reaction to the raven.

• Grieving Partner [17:12]: "You came here to break my heart all over again. Leave my consciousness. I dismiss you. I banish you. Leave me be."
  Demonstrates the protagonist's desperate attempt to reject the raven and, symbolically, his grief.

Conclusion

"POE: The Raven" is a profound exploration of mourning and the human psyche's fragility. By adapting Edgar Allan Poe's classic poem into a modern narrative, Full Body Chills successfully captures the timeless essence of grief while introducing contemporary elements such as psychedelic experiences. The episode serves as a poignant reminder of the enduring struggle to find peace amidst loss and the shadows that haunt those left behind.

Final Thoughts

For listeners who appreciate psychological horror and literary adaptations, "POE: The Raven" offers a deeply immersive experience. Through its evocative storytelling and chilling symbolism, the episode invites audiences to reflect on their own encounters with loss and the lengths to which one might go to seek closure.

Transcript

[Narrator]

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[Edgar Allan Poe]

Few names are so feared and revered as that of po. His work extends time. His fiendish depictions and gloomy descriptions stalk the modern consciousness. And that is because his stories touch on our morbid fascinations, our everyday life and fears. Love, hate, death. Excuse me, there's someone I'd like you to meet. This is Lenore. She's a common raven, but you shouldn't call her that, for Lenore is friends with the Grim Reaper. Metaphorically, at least. Throughout many cultures, the raven has been seen as an omen of death. But what does that mean? Look inside a dictionary and you'll find less lines than a crossword puzzle. Death is a mystery beyond simplification. Yet if there's one thing we know for certain, outside the moral histories of ancient religion, no one has ever returned from death. And in this story, despite what one woman would dream to be true, that truth is painfully recalled in one word by one bird. The Raven.

[Jake Weber]

Bereft by Jake Weber Adapted.

[Grieving Partner]

From the poem the Raven by Edgar Allan Poe, 2021 why is the measure of love loss? This is the opening line of a book that I'm reading. The narrator has lost a lover to someone else, and I shouldn't be reading books like this. Books about the loss of someone who was beloved and who will never return. But I can't help myself. I'm not fit company. All I do is think about her. She's never coming back. But I never left. She died in a car crash. I wasn't in the car, but I could have been. She was killed by a drunk college kid who survived. He took Lenore's life. He destroyed mine and his own.

[Jake Weber]

How would that kid ever forgive himself?

[Grieving Partner]

That was three years ago. I still live in the Cabin Lenore and I shared in the woods near Lake Champlain in Vermont. We lived simply. I mean, we didn't need much, only each other and Mother Nature. Lenore worked in a bakery, and I was studying to be a botanist. We fell in love in college, the same college as the kid who killed her. We stayed in Vermont because we loved it and we loved each other. Now I live alone here, and I know I should move. All around me are things of hers and memories of us. But I can't bear to leave. My parents have tried to shake me out of it. You have to leave the cabin, they tell me.

[Jake Weber]

You have to change your environment. You'll never move on if you don't.

[Grieving Partner]

And I know that they're right. One day I'll have to leave this place. But I can't tear myself away and start anew. Not. Not just yet. I don't socialize. I'm a recluse. My career plans are on hold because I can't get motivated to study. I deliver food for money, but I don't need much. It's a small cabin, rudimentary, basic plumbing and electricity. But I have Internet. I read novels mostly. I like Patricia Highsmith and Jeanette Winterson. And I walk in the woods and talk to Lenore. There are many forests in Vermont. It's known as the Green Mountain State. Those verdant woods are teeming with organisms, including a wide variety of mycelium, which you know as mushrooms. Mushrooms to saute or put on salads and pizza. And also little brown mushrooms that contain psilocybin, the psychedelic fruit of an underground network that was first called the flesh of the gods by the Mazatec Indians for the mystical or spiritual journey it could take you on. It's something we used to do together. Occasionally, Lenore and I would trip. There was a secret watering hole we loved, and we'd sun on the rocks and swim in that cold, clear water and kiss and feel connected to each other and to nature and to the cosmos. We would hike there from the cabin. I hadn't eaten a psilocybe since before Lenore died. But on a walk one afternoon, I saw one. I wasn't looking for it, it just called out to me. They look utterly nondescript, like any number of mycelia, and can fruit actually right next to a deadly mushroom. So you have to be careful and know exactly what you're looking for.

[Jake Weber]

But if you've seen one before, your.

[Grieving Partner]

Eye automatically goes to it. Something called the pop out effect. And there was another one.

[Jake Weber]

Close to the first.

[Grieving Partner]

I plucked them both, pulled them up with a little soil and a small knot of white mycelium. It's the sophisticated underground neural network that basically nurtures much of the ecosystem in a forest. Fungi are remarkable organisms with extraordinary medicinal properties. Penicillin was derived from a fungus.

[Jake Weber]

Fungi can decompose even crude oil and.

[Grieving Partner]

Turn it into organic material. They use mycelia on oil spills. I dropped them in my pocket, one for me and one for Lenore, and they sat drying on the kitchen windowsill for a few days, until one evening I decided to eat them in between.

[Jake Weber]

Bites of dark chocolate to cut the bitterness.

[Grieving Partner]

I don't know why on that moonless.

[Jake Weber]

December night, I decided to trip for the first time since Lenore died, but I did.

[Grieving Partner]

As I waited for the psilocybin to take effect, I stared at the fire I always made on winter evenings, and I watched as the ashes landed on the stone hearth. The mushrooms were starting to kick in because those ashes were becoming spectral as they left the leaping flames and landed on the stone. I lay down on the sofa to welcome in the experience I was about to have. It's important to lean into a psychedelic experience.

[Jake Weber]

Whatever happens, whatever the journey, one is.

[Grieving Partner]

Better off accepting and not resisting.

[Jake Weber]

But it was Lenore I was hoping for.

[Grieving Partner]

People on psychedelics, whether psilocybin or lsd, have found relief from grief, depression, addiction, the fear of death. I had read of someone on psilocybin finding all the people who had meant something to her, who were no longer living or presently in her life, hanging.

[Jake Weber]

Like stalactites in a cave. And that experience was not horrifying as it sounds, but comforting and deeply moving.

[Grieving Partner]

She had been partially responsible for someone's death when she was a teenager, and.

[Jake Weber]

There was that person in a state.

[Grieving Partner]

Of grace, and the moment they shared.

[Jake Weber]

During that psychedelic experience stayed with her for the rest of her life. I closed my eyes and waited to fully step into a hallucinogenic realm when I heard a tapping at the door so faint I could hardly make it out. I opened my eyes and watched the curtains undulate and a terror crept up in me. Was this going to be a bad trip to alter the trajectory of a hallucinogenic journey?

[Grieving Partner]

If you are experiencing it alone and.

[Jake Weber]

Without a guide, you need to change your environment.

[Grieving Partner]

Or music, if you have some playing, Which I did not.

[Jake Weber]

The curtains were assuming demonic forms, and my heart rate rose until it was pulsing through my body and beating a deafening drum in my ear. Dum, dum, dum, dum. Dum dum. I could hear that tapping sound from outside the cabin. Louder now, insistent. I was gripped by paranoia.

[Raven]

No company, please. No visitors.

[Jake Weber]

I did not want company, not while I was tripping, and on a bad one at that. Who could be out there? I never had visitors. Everyone knew I was solitary. Was I in danger? Alone in my cabin in the woods? I had no choice but to lean into the experience, except the fear and hope it would pass through me and that I could move on to a different phase of the trip. So I went to the door and. And open it to the cold Vermont winter. There was no one there. The relief and the shock of the cold would rid me of the fear I had felt inside, I thought the.

[Grieving Partner]

Sky was an impenetrable wall of black. No moon or stars on this overcast night. I knew I couldn't stay in the.

[Jake Weber]

Doorway for long in the cold, but.

[Grieving Partner]

I was compelled by that black sky. Behind that shield of clouds was a.

[Jake Weber]

Teeming universe, a vital, mysterious cosmos of which I was a part and of which Lenore was a part. I wanted to connect with her again. I wanted to know there was a continuum, a dimension after life.

[Grieving Partner]

Call it heaven or a soul or whatever you like.

[Jake Weber]

But I wanted desperately to believe Lenore didn't just ignore exist in memory. That in essence of her was still out there if I could only access it and then I could say goodbye.

[Grieving Partner]

As I never got to in life.

[Jake Weber]

I could reconcile with my grief. There would be some respite. She had been ripped away from me. One minute my vital lover, my partner, the next, an inert corpse. I was lost without her. I was bereft. I whispered her name and it was whispered back to me. There couldn't be an echo, not out here. I wasn't in a cave. I was in the woods. In my altered consciousness, my voice had boomeranged back to me. I called her name again, and again it came back. I was getting cold now, shivering and starting to twitch. I would have to go in. I closed the door and warmed myself by the fire and tingled all over as if an electric current were running through me, as if my entire body had pins and needles. Then there was a rap, rap, rap again at one of the window shutters. Was that the wind? That wasn't the wind. There it was again. A steady, insistent knock on the slatted wood panel. I had wanted the shutters. They kept the cabin dark and cozy. We felt safe behind them, Lenore and I. Private, insular. There it was again, a loud tapping from outside that Locked up my breath in fear. Step in to the experience, I said to myself. Welcome, whatever will be. I went to the window, drew the curtain, unfastened the latch and threw open the shutters. Outside was a huge bird, a black raven, staring in at me with blazing eyes. I staggered back and he flew inside and perched on the bookcase, his gaze fixed on me. Was he a figment of my imagination? Had I conjured him in a hallucinogenic state? Or was he real? Either way, there he was. And if there was a large, fierce bird in my cabin, even if only in my mind, I would engage it. I asked his name and he spoke. A human word came from his beak. He replied to me. Nevermore. Nevermore, he said. What kind of a name was Nevermore? I asked. He didn't answer, but kept eye contact locked in on me, intense. I was communicating in language with an animal, a bird whom I had summoned somehow. I asked the raven if he were here to stay, or would he leave like others, like Lenore? And he repeated that word, nevermore. I thought to myself. He could have learned that word from someone, someone as bereft as me, someone unhappy, who had repeated the words. Never. Never more had he picked it up as a parrot would. I pulled a chair up in front of the bird so we were up close now, almost eye to eye. The raven never fluttered, just stared back at me with fierce eyes. I asked again what he meant by nevermore. Then the air, the air in the cabin became thick with a scent. It was Lenore.

[Raven]

It was the smell of her skin in the morning, the smell of her neck. Was she here? Had she come back to me?

[Grieving Partner]

Had.

[Raven]

Had the bird been sent by some higher power to bring Lenore to me so I could have a sensory experience of her one last time? Would I then be able to let her go, to say goodbye and move on with my life? I asked the raven, and he repeated that word, nevermore. My stomach dropped. The raven has been represented, mythologized, as a symbol of death. And the bird now felt to me an ominous presence. There was a malevolent creature in my home. This was not a divine presence, but its opposite. Had the devil taken this form? A devil who had taken the love of my life? Had he come here to torment me? To taunt me? I was filled with terror again and demanded of the bird, are you the devil? Are you his emissary? But there was no response. So then I begged, I begged in answer to a single question. Would I heal? Would I ever get over the loss of Lenore? And the raven answered, nevermore. So that was that. That was to be my lot in life. But what about Lenore? Was she in heaven? Was there such a place? Was she at peace?

[Jake Weber]

I asked. The bird replied ominously, nevermore.

[Raven]

A sound came up in me, a protest from somewhere primitive, a primordial scream, and I shouted, get out. Get out, you beast. You hateful, evil creature.

[Grieving Partner]

Go to hell.

[Raven]

You came here to break my heart all over again. Leave my consciousness. I dismiss you. I banish you. Leave me be.

[Jake Weber]

And the raven said, nevermore. And didn't move a feather, just stayed.

[Raven]

Perfectly still with demonic eyes boring in on mine.

[Jake Weber]

I was in pain and now terrified. And there was no going back. It was going to be a long night.

[Grieving Partner]

I had five more hours before the.

[Jake Weber]

Psilocybin would begin to wear off and.

[Grieving Partner]

I could come back to reality.

[Jake Weber]

That was a lifetime. That was an eternity. How would I make it through? What kind of psychological torment would I have to endure? Would I be the same after? The light from the table lamp cast the long shadow of the raven across my cabin, a monstrous floating figure that hovered over the floor. Inside that shadow was my shattered heart, my heavy heart that would be lifted. Nevermore. I would never be reconciled with my grief. It would always be mine to bear. There would be no respite, no relief. I would never get over Lenore. My lovely Lenore. The measure of love would always be my loss.

[Grieving Partner]

PO is an Audio Chuck Original this.

[Jake Weber]

Episode was read to you by Ashley Flowers.

[Grieving Partner]

So what do you think Chuck?

[Jake Weber]

Do you approve?

[Narrator]

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[Narrator]

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[Grieving Partner]

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