THE WILL O’ THE WISP

Over the moorland, over the moor,

Sibilant sounds the rain-storm's sneer,

Sneeringly sounds, yet with a lure

Like the lure of the mermaids of the mere,

Calling the fishermen into their snare —

Through watery veils, my dim eyes peer,

Where can a light or a path be, where?

Lost on the moor, the moorland drear —

Lost, and the storm-lion's out of his lair,

Raging rampant with mighty roar;

And the glistening lightning flashes its glare;

And the torrents descend with a wind-driven pour.

Only the lightning to show by its fire

The tears of Heaven flooding Earth's floor;

And, above the sound of the storm-lion's ire,

Shriek the rain-sheets over the tor,

Shriek in a quavering, tuneless choir.

What's that in the distance shining afar?

See it flickering higher and higher,

Light in a broadening, lengthening bar —

Who is abroad at this lonely hour?

Or is it a cottage high on the scar?

Or does it shine in My Lady's tower

To guide her Lord from lands afar?

Nearer and nearer, I haste — Oh, for power

To reach that light — Oh, to be sure,

My Lady would welcome me in her bower —

I fall; I sink; it was the marsh's lure —