XXIX - Night

by C.S. Lewis

　　I know a little Druid woodWhere I would slumber if I couldAnd have the murmuring of the streamTo mingle with a midnight dream,And have the holy hazel treesTo play above me in the breeze,And smell the thorny eglantine;For there the white owls all night longIn the scented gloom divineHear the wild, strange, tuneless songOf faerie voices, thin and highAs the bat's unearthly cry,And the measure of their shoonDancing, dancing, under the moon,Until, amid the pale of dawnThe wandering stars begin to swoon. . . .Ah, leave the world and come away!The windy folk are in the glade,And men have seen their revels, laidIn secret on some flowery lawnUnderneath the beechen covers,Kings of old, I've heard them say,Here have found them faerie loversThat charmed them out of life and kissedTheir lips with cold lips unafraid,And such a spell around them madeThat they have passed beyond the mistAnd found the Country-under-wave. . . .Kings of old, whom none could save!