Ahem… None of this is true. The only part that is close is the “Reynolds” thing, though it’s unclear if that really happened and many Poe scholars consider it apocryphal. Before being checked into the hospital, it was noted his clothes were ragged – quite unusual for Poe – and did not fit well. Poe never drank absinthe, nor was he running through the streets in his final hours. Poe’s final few days were actually quite normal: he fell in and out of consciousness at a hospital before dying there.