Conqueror Worm

words by Edgar Allan Poe
168 wide x 274 tall
4,121 total stitches in 1 color

A stitched lament for humanity's tragic finale.
This counted cross stitch pattern features a chilling excerpt from Edgar Allan Poe's The Conqueror Worm, a poem that frames human existence as a doomed performance—its hero, a blood-red worm that devours the cast. Beneath the text slithers a stylized earthworm, oversized and theatrical, embodying the poem's final line: "And its hero the Conqueror Worm."
Whether you see it as gothic satire, existential embroidery, or a stitched memento mori, this pattern invites you to thread dread into linen with poetic precision.