Hallowe'en

[avarwaen]

All Hallows Eve — when ghosts do walk the earth:
All Hallows Eve — O light and fireside mirth!
Ah, leave the gay revel and the merry din,
Set the door upon the latch and let the ghosts in.

There comes no dream-lover stepping from the lane,
No pitiful white creature a-beating at the pane:
There is no herb to be gathered nor spell to be said,
And still in the grey graveyard lie the waiting dead.

When the shadows gather, in a room apart,
To the still glow of the firelight, to the dreaming heart,
Far from the loud frolic and the dancers' din,
Friendly out of the gloaming the dear ghosts come —

Come, when the wind wakens like an olden song,
With smiles half-forgotten and voices lost long, —
With a well-beloved footstep lingering at the door,
Hands full of old posies that smell sweet as of yore . . .

All Hallows Eve — when dreams do rule on earth!
All Hallows Eve — O the feasting and the mirth!
Ah, leave the loud laughter and the dance and din,
Set the door upon the latch and let the ghosts in.

Cicely Fox Smith



The woods are haggard and lonely,
The skies are hooded for snow,
The moon is cold in Heaven,
And the grasses are sere below.
The bearded swamps are breathing
A mist from meres afar,
And grimly the Great Bear circles
Under the pale Pole Star.
There is never a voice in Heaven,
Nor ever a sound on earth,
Where the spectres of winter are rising
Over the night's wan girth.

There is slumber and death in the silence,
There is hate in the winds so keen;
And the flash of the north's great sword-blade
Circles its cruel sheen.

The world grows agèd and wintry,
Love's face peakèd and white;
And death is kind to the tired ones
Who sleep in the north to-night.

William Wilfred Campbell