The Works of The Ettrick Shepherd Centenary Edition. With a Memoir of the Author, by the Rev. Thomas Thomson ... Poems and Life. With Many Illustrative Engravings [by James Hogg] |
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 | The Works of The Ettrick Shepherd |  |
The Mermaid's Song.
Lie still, my love, lie still and sleep,
Long is thy night of sorrow;
Thy maiden of the mountain deep
Shall meet thee on the morrow.
But oh, when shall that morrow be,
When my true love shall waken;
When shall we meet, refined and free,
Amid the moorland braken?
Long is thy night of sorrow;
Thy maiden of the mountain deep
Shall meet thee on the morrow.
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When my true love shall waken;
When shall we meet, refined and free,
Amid the moorland braken?
Full low and lonely is thy bed,
The worm even flies thy pillow;
Where now the lips, so comely red,
That kiss'd me 'neath the willow?
Oh, I must smile, and weep the while,
Amid my song of mourning,
At freaks of man in life's short span,
To which there's no returning.
The worm even flies thy pillow;
Where now the lips, so comely red,
That kiss'd me 'neath the willow?
Oh, I must smile, and weep the while,
Amid my song of mourning,
At freaks of man in life's short span,
To which there's no returning.
Lie still, my love, lie still and sleep,
Hope lingers o'er thy slumber:
What though thy years beneath the steep
Should all its flowers outnumber;
Though moons steal o'er, and seasons fly
On time-swift wing unstaying?
Yet there's a spirit in the sky,
That lives o'er thy decaying.
Hope lingers o'er thy slumber:
What though thy years beneath the steep
Should all its flowers outnumber;
Though moons steal o'er, and seasons fly
On time-swift wing unstaying?
Yet there's a spirit in the sky,
That lives o'er thy decaying.
In domes beneath the water springs,
No end hath my sojourning;
And to this land of fading things
Far hence be my returning;
For all the spirits of the deep
Their long last leave are taking.
Lie still, my love, lie still and sleep,
Till the last morn is breaking.
No end hath my sojourning;
And to this land of fading things
Far hence be my returning;
For all the spirits of the deep
Their long last leave are taking.
Lie still, my love, lie still and sleep,
Till the last morn is breaking.
| The Works of The Ettrick Shepherd | |