The mystery behind “Come Little Children” from Hocus Pocus
The mysterious extra verses of Come Little Children…
There is a lingering and strange urban legend that claims the “extended” version of “Come Little Children” (the song from Hocus Pocus) is actually an obscured and unpublished poem by Edgar Allan Poe.
This is simply not true. The earliest record of this claim comes from an Internet message board post from 2006 where the “Garden of Shadows” lyrics first appeared. Before 2006 there was no trace of this version of the lyrics on or off The Internet.
Original Come Little Children lyrics:
Come little children, I’ll take thee away,
Into a land of enchantment.
Come little children, the time’s come to play,
Here in my garden of magic.
The lyrics would then repeat as necessary, sometimes with humming.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEYgyWC_BpM
And here is the supposed Edgar Allan Poe version: (Sometimes known as “Garden of Shadows”)
Come little children, I’ll take thee away,
Into a land of enchantment.
Come little children, The time’s come to play,
Here in my garden of shadows.
Follow sweet children, I’ll show thee the way,
Through all the pain and the sorrows.
Weep not poor children, For life is this way,
Murdering beauty and passions.
Hush now dear children, It must be this way,
To weary of life and deceptions.
Rest now my children, For soon we’ll away,
Into the calm and the quiet.
Come little children, I’ll take thee away,
Into a land of enchantment.
Come little children, The time’s come to play,
Here in my garden of shadows.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKlsUrfbiE0
And here are the alternate version of the supposed lost lyrics. This is known as the Garden of Mystery version. And as you can see the lyrics aren’t quite as good as the Garden of Shadows version. The Garden of Shadows version is the oldest known “extended” lyrics and the first to be mistakenly credited to Edgar Allan Poe. Those lyrics date back to 2006. This version is newer in comparison.
Come little children, I’ll take thee away,
Into a land of enchantment.
Come little children, the time’s come to play,
Here in my garden of magic.
Come little children, the time’s drawing near,
Halloween night is waning.
Come little children, ride with me tonight,
It’s not a night for abstaining.
Come little children, now follow me home,
Not a one of you need worry.
Come little children, the time’s come to roam,
Come follow me now please hurry.
Come little children, there’s magic to see,
Here in my garden of mystery.
Come little children, in to my abode,
Tomorrow you all will be history.
Why someone claimed the “extended” lyrics were Edgar Allan Poe is anyone’s guess but many people assumed it was true and to this very day you will find people who believe the urban legend despite there being no record of the poem in any Poe omnibus or documentation pre-dating a 2006 Internet message board post.
There is also the simple fact that these lyrics do not match Edgar Allan Poe’s writing style.
Ironically there is a poem with a similar style to Come little Children’s Garden of Shadows version (the supposed Poe version). This poem is “The Stolen Child” which is about a child being lured away from the cruel world of humans and into the realm of Faerie. It was by William Butler Yeats.
Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats;
There we’ve hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.
Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim gray sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.
Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.
Away with us he’s going,
The solemn-eyed:
He’ll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than he can understand.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izYzuG0Vh2k
The Stolen Child has been put to music several times. The most famous version being by singer Loreena McKennitt.
There is a distinct similarity between lines like “Weep not, poor children for life is that way” and “For the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.” But even with the similarities to The Stolen Child it’s not likely that Come Little Children has any connection to any nineteenth century or early twentieth century poet.
The claim of the extended version of the Come Little Children being the work of Edgar Allan Poe could be a legitimate mistake that has just perpetuated itself online with various other tidbits of misinformation but if that is so then where did these mysterious extra verses come from? Why create such a hoax?
The original history of the song is quite mundane.
When Hocus Pocus was being finished for its 1993 theatrical release, extra music accompaniment was added by the now late James Horner (Who at the time did a lot of children’s films, including Casper).
The song Come Little Children was to be sung by the witch, Sarah Sanderson (Sarah Jessica Parker). Sarah was one of the three Sandrson Sisters. They were the witch antagonists of the movie. In the film the song had the mysterious power to enthrall children so Sarah could lure them away for their diabolical purposes.
While James Horner provided the melody of the song the lyrics were by Brock Walsh. Brock Walsh attributed the Edgar Allan Poe confusion to his own known childhood obsession with the works of Edgar Allan Poe. This is according to the Disney Wikia. However this explanation does not account for the supposed extended lyrics being attributed to Edgar Allan Poe.
http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Come_Little_Children
The mysterious “Edgar Allan Poe” version of the lyrics (which are NOT Poe at all but no one knows where the extra verses came from) were made popular when covered by singer Kate Covington (Kate the Great) on Youtube with a very haunting version that can be heard on several Youtube videos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKlsUrfbiE0
Perhaps the Garden of Shadows version (the version Edgar Allan Poe has been falsely credited with writing) really was written by faeries or goblins to lure away lonely or unwanted children into the realm of Faerie to be transformed into faeries themselves…
At this point nearly anything is possible in regard to the source of these mysterious and haunting extra lyrics.
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