Song, Chant, Poetry, Stories and Satire for the Pagan Community

This entry made: 01/13/2000

Title: The Wintry Queen
Lyrics by: Gwydion Pendderwen
Tune: original
Date: 1972
Source: http://www.earthspirit.com/twnls.html
Recorded on: "This Winter's Night," Mothertongue, 1998 (earthspirit@earthspirit.com, EarthSpirit Community, P.O. Box 723-N, Williamsburg, MA 01096)
Subject: Sabbats - Yule

Blood red skies in the morning,
Pitch-black heavens every night
Take them both as a warning
That the winter fire need be bright.

Fierce the blaze on the mountain
Sheds its light for miles around 
While the stream and the fountain 
Lie frozen and locked in the ground.

Chorus:	Now the leprous* white Lady
	Leads her train of the lost
	Leads the spirits through glade and wood 
	And goodly fields of frost.

Summer's consort waxed brightly
The tall and golden-haired prince
And she came to him nightly
With pomegranate and quince.

Dead and gone is her lover
The most fair and radiant of all
Now she'll never recover
The king cut down in the fall.

While the climbing sun tarried
As if his marches were stayed 
At midsummer they married 
Mortal man and immortal maid

Has a king ever reckoned
What he gives for the boreal crown?
To be god but a second
Ere the sun starts his course ever down.

Through the summer and after
In the sere and brown of the fall
Days were filled with their laughter
And nights with their echoing call

But as autumn leaves smoulder
And the smoke slowly drifts through the air
So the young king grew older
And withered and died in despair

Nine white maidens attend her
Where she treads without leaving spoor
As she seeks her defender
Who shall wear the crown once more.

By the light of the beacon
You can see her pass through the ring 
She'll not weary nor weaken
Till she finds her winter time king.

[If, like me, you don't much care for this word, 
try using "wintry" instead.]