Grave marker features an ode by Poe

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) -- Elizabeth Arnold Poe, an actress and mother of 19th-century poet Edgar Allan Poe, is buried at St. John's Church, site of Patrick Henry's oration in the previous century.
Kay Peninger, the church's executive director, explains that her grave is "outside holy ground" because the church did not approve of women in that profession.
After becoming ill on tour, Elizabeth Poe died of tuberculosis in Richmond in 1811. A local family, the Allans, took custody of son Edgar, who later enrolled at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville for a semester. Misguided in other ways, Poe left no doubt about his feelings for his mother.
An inscription on her marker, donated by the university's Raven Society in 1927, uses the following excerpt from Poe:
"... the writer of this article is himself the son of an actress --
"has invariably made it his boast --
"and no earl was ever prouder of his earldom
"than he of the descent from a woman
"who, although well born,
"hesitated not to consecrate to the drama
"her brief career of genius and of beauty."