The T12: an Electrician's Halloween Poem

Electrician's / electrical contractor's everywhere, rejoice: there's a new Halloween tradition just for you, this electrician's Halloween poem.

Oh, we hope English teachers and Edgar Allan Poe fans and Halloween enthusiasts everywhere will love it. But we think those who work with light bulbs will have a unique appreciation for the lighting references.

Written in the style of Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven" (a parody of "The Raven"), we no longer have a raven antagonizing the narrator, but a T12 fluorescent bulb. And we no longer hear the familiar refrain, "Nevermore." Instead, the T12 taunts the narrator with its single word: "T4."

For those who are unfamiliar, T12 bulbs are older, larger fluorescent bulbs, largely replaced today by narrower and more efficient T8 and T5 bulbs as well as linear LEDs. A T4 bulb is even narrower than these, but is not used as a T12 replacement.

​Without further ado, here is our electrician's Halloween video, followed by the transcript of the poem. Please share with those you think will love it!
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​The T12: an Electrician's Halloween Poem

​Once upon a midnight dreary, while I wandered, weak and weary,
Down many an unlit hallway and across the creaking floor --
While I looked for bulb replacements that I'd put into the basement,
Suddenly there came a tapping, a rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered. And here I opened up my door.
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there asking, fearing
That I'd put a new lamp on my porch, and not so long before.
Yet now that lamp was broken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "T4."
And I whispered back to know for sure; the darkness said "T4."
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into my chamber turning, wondering why the lights weren't burning,
Soon again I heard a rapping somewhat louder than before.
And determined to know who could be there tapping on my door,
I flung back the cursed thing again, this mystery to explore.
And in there stepped a light bulb from the saintly days of yore,
A T12 tube to be precise; a fluorescent to be sure.

Then this inefficient light entered in while glowing white,
Dimly white and awful with a buzzing to abhor.
"But you're dreadful," said I to the lamp, "and your kind has been revamped,
and it's like you're but a remnant that's been washed up on the shore.
Tell me now why you've thus washed up on my shore."
Quoth the light bulb, "T4."

Much I marveled that this ancient light should face now such an awful plight,
Speaking words with little meaning while standing dim upon my floor.
"Not at all," I told it plainly to the words it spoke insanely.
"It's the T8 that's replaced you as you stand there on my floor.
Or T5 lamps and LEDs, for these we can't ignore. But never that which you have named."
Yet the light bulb said, "T4."

Startled that the light bulb would so wrongly answer as it stood,
I countered with a calmness that I'd never felt before.
A calmness as a silence mastered just ahead some dark disaster
Spoken slow and then much faster to drown the message that it bore.
"T8s," I said so surely, "and not a miniscule T4."
But the light bulb said again, "T4."

"It makes no sense!" I stuttered as I shifted, all a-flutter,
"That you'd talk about a light bulb so small as a T4."
I stood a moment blinking as my spirits started sinking,
Then I spoke more fervently to this T12 on my floor.
"Tell me why my lights have failed. Tell me, I implore."
But the T12 only answered, "T4."

"Just look!" I yelled quite madly at the lamp that spoke so badly,
"My house is dark because the lights are out on every floor.
Surely you must see this and you surely must agree this
Is a thing that cannot be what the evening has in store.
I need the lights for reading and here you are unheeding;
My impatience is exceeding all the vex I've felt before."
Quoth the light bulb: "T4."

"T4," I said. "I know, I know. With your buzzing and your awful glow,
It's the only hint that you will show. But it tells me nothing more.
My lights are out and you know why, but you will hardly even try
Expressing what I must apply to light my home once more.
Begone then bulb, you wretched light; begone into this cursed night,
And let me face the silent fright of dark on every floor."
Quoth the light bulb, "T4."

And here I stared most grimly at the T12 glowing dimly,
My patience wearing thinly and my heart prepared for war.
"Incandescent light bulbs are all I have in store.
These and LEDs, and not a singular T4.
So out with all your taunting which has left my lights still wanting;
And stop with all this haunting of a man with lights no more."
But the light bulb said, "T4."

And the T12 with its glowing is not going, is not going,
But is standing with its buzzing just inside my chamber door.
And its flicker has the seeming of a demon that is dreaming,
For its lamp-light o'er me streaming throws a shadow on my floor;
And it's the only light I have now throwing shadows on the floor,
From a T12 saying only this -- "T4."