There was a dance in the moonlit glade,
And music played by the fairy band,
For elfin forms, as of Oberon’s aid,
Upon a summer night, beneath the land
Of ancient Tintagel, to the sound
Of merry harp and pipe did whirl around: —

Come, join hands! and lightly sway,
While our wings, in bright array,
Glisten in the silver ray;
Come, join hands, and dance with me!

Tintagel! thy dark and rugged pile
Hath seen, perchance, the spirits of the air
Flitting, at times, amid the moonbeam’s smile;
Or haply, when the storm-clouds did prepare
Their thunderbolts, thy lonely halls have rung
To fairy song, that from the caverns sprung.
Now, as to the lively tune
Of moonlit harp and pipe we swoon,
From the dim vaults, in chorus clear,
Now, methinks, their voice I hear,
Echoing o’er the restless sea;
Come, join hands, and dance with me!

Here, beneath the starry sky,
When the wind is hushed and shy,
And the waves are lull’d to sleep,
To the music soft and deep,
To the splendour of the night,
We perform our magic rite;—
Care and grief to us unknown,
To the stormy world are flown.

Hear no more life’s angry noise,
Heed not here its fleeting joys;
Far from life’s delusive dreams;
To the music of the streams,
To the radiance of the sky,
To the moon that beams on high,
To the splendour of the night,
We perform our magic rite,
While care and grief, to us unknown,
To the stormy world are flown.

A poem in anapestic tetrameter inspired by William Lisle Bowles’ poem Fairy Sketch 🧚‍♂️

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