Poetry Pumpkin

This Halloween I decided that I would do a few projects that would be crafty but festive for my house.  I found all sorts of amazing things on Pinterest, including the idea of using sharpies to decorate pumpkins for indoor use.  Some people just drew on their pumpkins, some people wrote on their pumpkins, and some people did both (see below).  The basic idea is just to spray paint the pumpkin and then get creative with your sharpie pens!  

My pumpkin was also obviously silver, rather than white.  Mostly because I had silver spray paint already and thought it would look cooler.  I like the way it turned out, but writing on the silver was more difficult than it would have been if I had used a matte color spray paint.  It was also probably harder to read.  

As for what to put on the pumpkin: I can't really draw very well, but the idea of poetry on a pumpkin seemed perfect for me, what with my love of books and all.  I love, love, love Poe's poetry...and basically everything he ever wrote.  However, I already had a passage from Edgar Allan Poe hanging on my wall, so I decided to go for something a bit different: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's "Haunted Houses."  

I think that my decorative indoor pumpkin turned out really well.  I made sure to pick a pumpkin that was whole and firm, with no soft or damaged spots.  I also made sure it had an appropriately nifty stem, which I covered with newspaper during the painting process.  I spray-painted it (two coats) about a week and a half before Halloween and it was still in good shape over a week after.      

Here is the poem I used, if you're interested:  

Haunted Houses

 All houses wherein men have lived and died

Are haunted houses. Through the open doors

The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,

With feet that make no sound upon the floors.

We meet them at the door-way, on the stair,

Along the passages they come and go,

Impalpable impressions on the air,

A sense of something moving to and fro.

There are more guests at table than the hosts

Invited; the illuminated hall

Is thronged with quiet, inoffensive ghosts,

As silent as the pictures on the wall.

The stranger at my fireside cannot see

The forms I see, nor hear the sounds I hear;

He but perceives what is; while unto me

All that has been is visible and clear.

We have no title-deeds to house or lands;

Owners and occupants of earlier dates

From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands,

And hold in mortmain still their old estates.

The spirit-world around this world of sense

Floats like an atmosphere, and everywhere

Wafts through these earthly mists and vapours dense

A vital breath of more ethereal air.

Our little lives are kept in equipoise

By opposite attractions and desires;

The struggle of the instinct that enjoys,

And the more noble instinct that aspires.

These perturbations, this perpetual jar

Of earthly wants and aspirations high,

Come from the influence of an unseen star

An undiscovered planet in our sky.

And as the moon from some dark gate of cloud

Throws o’er the sea a floating bridge of light,

Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd

Into the realm of mystery and night,—

So from the world of spirits there descends

A bridge of light, connecting it with this,

O’er whose unsteady floor, that sways and bends,

Wander our thoughts above the dark abyss.