The Dance Of The Moon Beams
O the moonbeams dance down the broad expanse
Of a path o’er the heaving sea,
And they blithely trip from tip to tip
Of the billows ranging free.
Down a highway bright of silvery light
They dance to the ghostly moon,
In the sprightly set of a minuet
And the whirl of a rigadoon.
To our lonely shore like a burnished floor
Streams that river of luminous sheen;
’Tis a fairy track through the shadows black
’Tis a bridge that spans between.
The regions here and that unseen sphere
Far off in the western sky,
Where the day is done with the setting sun
And the sunsets fade and die.
Where the moon holds court and her minions sport
As over the seas they roam,
And they dance their way through the glistening spray
And laugh in the rippling foam.
“O the night is ours and its witching powers
“And there’s never an eye to mark,
“For the demons sleep in the caverned deep
“And the goblins of the dark.
“Are far away where the shadows gray
“On the spectral sand dunes lie,
“So join in our mirth that is not of the earth
“But more of the sea and the sky!”
To the rhythmic beat of their twinkling feet
The creaming breakers fret,
As to and fro on a rollicking toe
They gracefully pirouette.
For the surges roll o’er the murmuring shoal
Through a brooding harmony
And the night wind sings of unspoken things
In an eerie melody.
“O cast your cares on the buoyant airs
“Where the star points smoulder dim”
Is their lilting song as they float along
To the skyline’s molten rim.
As their footsteps pave o’er the frosted wave
A path to the magic west,
With a carefree shout we would join the rout
And follow their homing quest.
But our feet are banned from that faery land
Though our vaulting fancy yearns
As it throbs in tune to the dying moon
Till the morning redly burns.
With our hearts in tune to the dying moon
We stand in the hush of dawn;
There are cryptic runes on the windswept dunes
But that luminous path has gone.
And the wet sands lie neath the empty sky
As drear as the lifeless sea,
But through our dreams flit the elfin beams
Of that moonsprite revelry.