The Neighbourhood Gets a Little Weird
The steeples are white in the wild moonlight,
And the trees have a silver glare;
Past the chimneys high see the vampires fly,
And the harpies of upper air,
That flutter and laugh and stare.
The poem wastes absolutely no time establishing its atmosphere.
We begin with white steeples glowing beneath the moon, trees reflecting the strange light and, because apparently the neighbourhood needed a little extra decoration, vampires flying above the chimneys.
And then Lovecraft adds harpies.
This is not exactly the sort of Halloween where somebody puts a plastic skeleton on the front porch and calls it a day.
The opening stanza is particularly effective because it starts with something visually familiar.
Church steeples.
Trees.
Chimneys.
These are ordinary elements of a landscape.
Lovecraft simply changes the lighting and introduces supernatural creatures.
Suddenly, the familiar world isn't familiar anymore.
That's one of the oldest tricks in horror, and it remains one of the most effective.
You don't necessarily have to invent a completely terrifying location.
Sometimes you just have to show the audience what's hiding in the one they already know.
