Norman Bates' Character was Based on a Serial Killer Named Edward Gein, Just Saying...

Alright.  Edward.  Creepy stuff here.  Along with Anna, all I could think of while reading this poem was Psycho, the 1960's classic thriller.  I did a little inch-deep skimming of some research, and I did in fact discover that Norman Bates (the serial killer from the movie) was inspired by a real madman named Edward Gein from 1957.  And because the poem was published anonymously (I have no idea when, either), it sounds to me like we're fittin' into some sort of cone of reason here (nevermind that both Leatherface from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Jame Gumb from The Silence of the Lambs were also created from his ego).  Anyways, the poem itself was just eerie in my opinion.  A son, Edward, after being questioned by his mother, confesses that he killed his father.  "Mother dear", however, shows little to no remorse over the murder, instead rather we get the feeling that she set the whole thing up in the first place.  This is proven, as well as Edward's feelings of guilt, in the second half of the final stanza, "The curse of hell from me shall ye bear, / Mother, Mother, / The curse of hell from me shall ye bear, / Such counsels you gave to me, O" [lines 53-56, emphasis added].  By not telling the whole story as to what happened, though, the author effectively keeps us bamboozled, left only with the assumption that the poem is indeed an homage to Hitchcock.

Classic. View at your own discretion...muahahaha :]