The leaves were long, the grass was green,

The hemlock-umbels tall and fair,

And in the glade a light was seen

Of stars in shadow shimmering.

Tinuviel was dancing there

To music of a pipe unseen,

And light of stars was in her hair,

And in her raiment glimmering.



There Beren came from mountains cold,

And lost he wandered under leaves,

And where the Elven-river rolled

He walked alone and sorrowing.

He peered between the hemlock-leaves

And saw in wonder flowers of gold

Upon her mantle and her sleeves,

And her hair like shadow following.



Enchantment healed his weary feet

That over hills were doomed to roam;

And forth he hastened, strong and fleet,

And grasped at moonbeams glistening.

Through woven woods in Elvenhome

She lightly fled on dancing feet,

And left him lonely still to roam

In the silent forest listening.



He heard there oft the flying sound

Of feet as light as linden-leaves,

Or music welling underground,

In hidden hollows quavering.

Now withered lay the hemlock-sheaves,

And one by one with sighing sound

Whispering fell the beechen leaves

In the wintry woodland wavering.



He sought her ever, wandering far

Where leaves of years were thickly strewn,

By light of moon and ray of star

In frosty heavens shivering.

Her mantle glinted in the moon,

As on a hill-top high and far

She danced, and at her feet was strewn

A mist of silver quivering.



When winter passed, she came again,

And her song released the sudden spring,

Like rising lark, and falling rain,

And melting water-bubbling.

He saw the elven-flowers spring

About her feet, and healed again

He longed by her to dance and sing

Upon the grass untroubling.



Again she fled, but swift he came,

Tinuviel! Tinuviel!

He called her by her elvish name;

And there she halted listening.

One moment stood she, and a spell,

His voice laid on her: Beren came,

And doom fell on Tinuviel

That in his arms lay glistening.



As Beren looked into her eyes

Within the shadows of her hair,

The trembling starlight of the skies

He saw there mirrored shimmering.

Tinuviel the elven-fair

Immortal maiden elven-wise,

About him cast her shadowy hair

And arms like silver glimmering.



Long was the way that fate them bore

O'er stony mountains cold and grey

Through halls of iron and darkling door

And woods of nightshade morrowless.

The Sundering Seas between them lay,

And yet at last they met once more,

And log ago they passed away

In the forest singing sorrowless.

Lo! Death has reared himself a throne
In a strange city lying alone
Far down within the dim West,
Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best
Have gone to their eternal rest.
There shrines and palaces and towers
(Time-eaten towers and tremble not!)
Resemble nothing that is ours.
Around, by lifting winds forgot,
Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie.

No rays from the holy Heaven come down
On the long night-time of that town;
But light from out the lurid sea
Streams up the turrets silently—
Gleams up the pinnacles far and free—
Up domes—up spires—up kingly halls—
Up fanes—up Babylon-like walls—
Up shadowy long-forgotten bowers
Of sculptured ivy and stone flowers—
Up many and many a marvellous shrine
Whose wreathed friezes intertwine
The viol, the violet, and the vine.

Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie.
So blend the turrets and shadows there
That all seem pendulous in air,
While from a proud tower in the town
Death looks gigantically down.

There open fanes and gaping graves
Yawn level with the luminous waves;
But not the riches there that lie
In each idol’s diamond eye—
Not the gaily-jewelled dead
Tempt the waters from their bed;
For no ripples curl, alas!
Along that wilderness of glass—
No swellings tell that winds may be
Upon some far-off happier sea—
No heavings hint that winds have been
On seas less hideously serene.

But lo, a stir is in the air!
The wave—there is a movement there!
As if the towers had ****** aside,
In slightly sinking, the dull tide—
As if their tops had feebly given
A void within the filmy Heaven.
The waves have now a redder glow—
The hours are breathing faint and low—
And when, amid no earthly moans,
Down, down that town shall settle hence,
Hell, rising from a thousand thrones,
Shall do it reverence.

Of our love
Of our smiles
Of our bond
Of our secrets
Of our trust
Of our dreams
     It's a portrait of we
      Of me and you
        Of us.

I sit here in the corner of my mind
And watch our lustrous moments fled
Away galloping like a wild roving Hind
Unto places dark as hair upon my head.

I sit here in the corner of my mind
And watch our moments fled twirl back.
Though of gold they were, I can't rewind;
For them unto thou are now but all dark.

I sit here in the corner of my mind
And think of bewitching eyes of thine
That upon a loss of thee bore me blind
For no star see I matching thy shine

I'll sit here in the corner of my mind
And long for thee my love, my bright star,
That forevermore shines upon my mind
Wherever I go, wherever I wander.


©Kikodinho Edward Alexandros,
Los Angeles, California, USA,
11/11/2018.

Wandering past Thousand Oaks,
There mines eyes met many folks
And among them was an old man
Whose beard was as white as a Swan,
Whose voice, was as rough as of a Crow
Whose cinder-like eyes all exuded woe.

Hey old folk, hey old folk, hey old folk,
Unto him I called as he laid by the Oak.
Unto me of thy woe speak If thee can,
But softly replied he, "look, young man,
When in days to come old you grow
I pray of woe thee may never know.

For lest thou ever, the less you'll talk.
Not far off lies my child as still as a rock,
For a ******* came, shooting he began;
And my dear child away couldn't run
That now her coldness thrice as of snow
Hath immersed my poor soul in sorrow."

At this, no more could I talk nor walk,
But grew mute and motionless as a rock
When said he, "if we had not a single gun,
Perhaps dear life would truly be fun."
Then vanished he, leavin' me in sorrow
That thee, dear reader might never know.


©Kikodinho Edward Alexandros,
Los Angeles, California, USA.
09th/Nov/2018.

autumn melts the skies
her oranges like
bright rouge,
her yellows a
half hidden sun.

the fires of a waking
world, blown by
the branches of the
wind,

forgotten, an
ending sweeter
than the last
fragments of day
that dream as they
fall, caught by the
torn breezes that
scatter the leaves
westward and skyward
like little ribbons hurrying
along a once summer path.