Leave the radiant sun, Of drowsy rest the giver; Leave the song of the birds and leave The sob of the river.
Break loose from his passionate arms, And awake from thy dream of bliss: King Death hath marked thy charms And fain would kiss.
“Oh, hear them in the Valley— The wailing voices cry! They count the yearly tally Of lost girls that must die. Cold fingers in the gloaming, Will grope one night for me; I daren’t go heather-roaming, For fear the ghosts will see.
“And now the rain is falling, They’ll cry the whole long night, I tremble at their calling— O take and hold me tight! Each of those warning spirits Was once a girl, betrayed; O wayward love, be true to me Who am no more a maid.”
The deer stand outlined on a sky That glows to red and pales to green: The restless pine-trees shake and sigh, And troubled spirits move, unseen.
A brooding quiet holds the night. It is the hour of dreams, of fears, When day’s defiant dying light Fades, with a sombre hint of tears.
We hardly speak, we hardly dare, Our steps are noiseless on the grass, And shadows haunt your eyes and hair. Does love pass as these moments pass?
Now slants the moonlight through the trees And bathes the pathway through the wood: The large leaves wrangle in the breeze And sigh, as if they understood.
Dear Heart, it is so still and warm, —A lovelier night there has not been— But lonely I have left the farm, And lonely I have crossed the green.
Sang a maid at peep of day To the blackbird in the yew— “My true heart has flown away, Seeking other heart as true.”
“Bird, my heart has taken wings,” Whispered she, with sorrowful eyes. “In the raging wind it sings, In the sun it cries, it cries.”
“He was a wilful chap,” said one “—The kind that often dies alone.”
“He shamed us all,” another said: “’Tis just as well that he be dead.”
“Poor Jack, poor Jack,” a third one sighed. “He swam to Bere against the tide
“And beat John Hawkins, on the green. It’s long since such a lad was seen.”
A fourth one laughed: “’Twould seem the town He loved so well has let him down.
“A poor thin corpse ’tis, to be sure, That he’s brought home to make manure.”
They swathed his body, tall and slim, Then screwed the oak lid down on him.
They put him in his deep-dug hole, And bawled responses for his soul.