Dancing at the Yew Tree

{Chorus}
8 are the steps to be reborn
Dancing at the Yew tree:
One for my laughter
Two for my pain
Three for my loss and
Four for my gain;
Five for my silver
Six for my gold
Seven for the secret I've never told
Eight, eight, come to the gate
Then from my dying be reborn

1.
An infant cries to say I'm near
When he wakes his Spring is here,
And when he crawls up to his edge
He soon discovers what he fears
Learns, learns songs of his soul
Finds that his edge is part of the whole
He looks out with broken heart
Open now to sing his part:

{Chorus}

2.
A man defiant crafts his life
Where he stands, his work is ripe
He must create to know the dark
He seeks his balance in his art
Turns, turns, tends to his ear
Knows from his listening honor's near
Brave the blooming come to seed
When the human bends his knees:

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Insert stanza:

A primal beast, a forest hound,
I'm touched with lust and nature bound,
I walk between my range and peace
And wrap my naked flesh in heat.
I'll leather scourge your skin 'til red
And scrape your belly 'til you've bled:
As I am life, so I am death,
My dungeon waits your anxious breath.
The blood you beat is all finite
I'll iron cuff you at your height,
I'll chain to post and bend your nerve
I'll hunt you 'til I've made you serve.
Bone songs, bone songs, bone songs:
Wield the craft until you've gone -
Your time to die is not too long.
I am the turning wheel that makes you strong.

3.
When winter snaps our brittle limbs
Bones shall root in snowy winds,
Gone the boundaries of our shape
Merge through mist in other ways
Raw, raw, cold is the field
Age, in closing, turns the wheel.
Bless the ending, bless the soil
Bless our shoots that earth shall sing:

{Chorus}

Copyright © 2011 James Lawer