Far up a musty mossy hill

That sat upon a cliff

Overlooking a finger-smudged swill

Of ocean rough with tiff,

A house rose up out of the brume

As murky as the sea

Like a withered ghastly bloom

From a dying apple tree.

And in the phantasmal abode

There lived a wraithlike boy,

From whom coldness always flowed,

Who rarely tasted joy.

He stayed up gazing at the moon

As which his skin was pale,

And relished the haunting cries of loons

Which made the children wail.

At midnight of each solstice

Into the dark he’d stride,

Whiffing up a silent bliss

Like Death himself had died,

And from the spectral beams of the sky

An ethereal voice would descend,

Through him a haunting song would fly

That brought time to an end,

And all the creatures that could hear

Would suddenly drop cold,

Dead as pebbles from a fear

Of something unfathomably old.

Glowing in the eerie light

The dreadful moon produced, 

His translucent face would glow pale white

As though he had been noosed,

And through his long sharp teeth would come

A low unearthly growl

Which all could hear, both old and young,

And was followed by a howl,

Which chilled the bones and froze the blood

And sent shivers plaguing the town,

And footsteps clawed through rainstorm mud

So deep a child could drown,

And the village would be ransacked

By a demon long unheard,

And all the poor souls horribly wracked

Before one could utter a word,

And great striated leathery wings

Unfurled against the moon,

And away would fly the frightful thing

Not to be seen until noon.