by Charles Reid

Created on: June 24, 2008

Nightly Summoning

Softly lofty whippoorwill calls
Sound sweetly soothingly among the trees
His nighttime serenade dreamily lulls
Me as I walk through the giants to sleep

Low lullabies I listen to long
So dearly do those notes beckon
A weary and love-spent traveler
To embrace the earth till rises the dawn

Dreary death in the waters may lurk
And shadows in the moonlight may dance

Yet gladly will I, the weary traveler
Allow yon young gods myself to entrance

No known enemy I see on the knoll
Nor gouls in the shadowy caves
Only a young fair maiden there
Who now my soul saves

Pleasant pillows of moss lie
Beneath my weary head
My maiden does now with soft, soft hands
Prepare so tenderly my bed

But better it were if my hands she'd not touched
And my lips with hers she had not brushed
For then my sleeping flame within me awoke
And oh, alas! her sweet cheeks became flushed

She sailed away before my eyes
And my flame then turned to naught
And I cursed myself for my hellfire desire
And her song I thereafter sought

And alas to this day she has evaded me
And I still do want her so
But my heart is learning to harden with ice
And my heart-spring will never again flow

I'll never go back to those woods again
The memory's too keen there
T`would pierce my heart and I'd die for love
For love of my beauty rare.

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