The Storyteller

Tell us a story!
Tell us a story!
All the circled children cried,
And like great book-covers opening
Granpa opened up his eyes.

He widened them in surprise.

Now children, children, children mine
What story would I tell?

Only the other day down at the well...
(Here all the children clapped and yelled)

Only the other day down at the well...
(Oh what a story he would tell!)

Only the other day down at the well...
(All the children now were still)

I met a ghostly bride...

Her story, now, was something else-
As she told it sad to me
The little whispering winds around
Moaned and crooned and keened,

Crying as she sat in white among the reeds.

The mists, without my knowing, too,
Were rolling from the West;
But I, transfixed, among the ferns
Was listening like a spindle turns

-Mesmerized, transfixed, it turns-
There down at the well...

She was white and strange and thin,
Bowing this-way-that in the lowing wind
And I would see her veil stray
Along the ground and far away
Calling shadows, come what may.

This bride upon the fell that day
Abandoned so cruel that way
Her moaning soul would always stay
Deep down by the well.