The Homecoming

I call, and only echoes answer.
The halls of Faerie are empty, and cold.
My footfalls ring in the silence,
When, I wonder, did all this grow old?

The Great Hall is sombre, quiet and dim,
Where once the feasting loudly clamoured.
Where once the Faerie Court did play,
And sport at some poor mortal we’d englamoured.

Here sat Titania, my pale queen,
Sharp as crystal, adder-deadly.
There capered Puck, in his Motley green,
Bare of foot and crowned with leaves.

These pale grey rags were tapestries rich,
Embroidered by Unseely maids,
Their silks spider-spun, gathered in a lych-
Yard, deep crimson-dyed with mortal blood.

I brush the eight legged usurpers from my throne,
Mount once more where I reigned of old.
But where have all my subjects gone?
Wherefore is the grate ashen cold?

Have I been gone so long? Was it not but this morn
That I set out on my quest? Surely not so long
That the very stones are cracked and worn?
Surely ‘twas a day? No more than two?

I fear some treachery in this. The scheming
Of my honey-tongued witch-wife.
Surely all this ruin’s but a seeming?
A glamour set to ‘maze and snare me?

Come out, my wife! Come back subjects all!
The jest was a fine one, but now ‘tis done!
Come! ‘Tis I, Oberon, who call!
Come out, I say! Show yourselves!

I call, and only echoes answer.
They are gone in truth, and not in jest.
I alone remain of all the Faerie Court,
A tattered spirit, who can find no rest.

Iain Muir lives in a suitcase somewhere in Europe. He is still trying to work out how many people he killed in his last life to deserve this. He pays rent on a place in the wilds of Africa, and tries to write poetry, SF, and fantasy in between catching planes.

Find more by Iain Muir in the Author Index

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