Hollow Mews

Rows of men and hollow mews The cobbled hearth grows cold The lights grow dim on life, on death But landscapes breathe with embers Futures draped in hollow dreams Our cradle burned, for lies Absence worn like a winter cloak This future, our own making Sing to the earth, not hollow mews And feast with the folk thought lost Turn slave to mindful wanderer Turn mind to break the chains Far from the empty house I fled Shadows taunt my periphery The solitude of silent halls Left behind forever Into the farthest forest I ran A home before my time I turned at a cry, and in her eyes I lost myself forever Sing to the earth, not hollow mews And feast with the folk thought lost Turn slave to mindful wanderer Turn mind to break the chains Sunlight, dappled, framed a shadow The queen of the forest was waiting Her hair hung like a gallows-braid Wild life, wild death made real In her eyes I saw a heron wading through rushes In her laugh I heard a darkness that light never touches