Night in New Forest
By Doreen Valiente (1922-1999)
Upon the sable shield of night
So shines the moon in heaven's height
Above the wildwood lone.
And cold the nightwind blowing free
Whistles around the withered tree
That used the trysting place to be,
It's trunk bleached white as stone.
On the far road the headlights beam
And pass like phantoms in a dream,
While here the starlight's gleam
Recalls time long ago.
Here witches met in olden time,
Away beyond the church bells' chime,
IN worship from the ancient prime
That it was death to know.
Ancestral voices fill the skies,
Starlight and witchfire in my eyes,
And echoes of lost centuries
Across this elfin ground.
And here again, in years of war,
They met as they had met before,
To weave the spell they wove of yore
And dance the circle's round.
Stirred by the night wind stealing by,
The bracken rustles with a sigh.
Deep in the wood an owl's cry
Calls from a distant tree.
This starry night no spectre shows,
No magic flame of bonfire glows;
But all around I feel them close
In ghostly company.
© Doreen Valiente
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