Winter Song

OUR Lady and her sisters spin the reeling fleece,
To clothe their bodies who are far from France--
Castle of winter, cloistral peace,
The joyful flames upon the hearthstone dance.

 

Spring trills his laughing soul over the snow's soft pillow,
The gay wheels are whirring round and round:
"Our sweet lords are warring o'er the billow,
Love shields his minions on heathen ground."

 

O Ladies, though the brave wheels make a rattle,
Birds of ill omen on the roofs alight,
Days are dying, months have taken flight,
Your good lords are dead in battle.

 

Our Lady all alone spins in the candle-light,
Her sisters lie beneath the cold gravestone,
Her hair makes her a winding-sheet of white,
Our Lady falls on sleeping in her bower all alone.

 

Listen, O Listen, lady, now thy spinning finished is:
The wind is weeping under the porches,
The wind this night has blown aslant the torches,
Is it not blood staining the panoplies?...

 

Ah! the wind moans low like a sick child afraid--
The good knights are dead in the Crusade.