A Blogger's (Silent) Poetry Reading

Grace's Poppies has initiated a poetry reading to celebrate St Brigid's day - a lovely idea. Here's an exerpt from one of my favorites (just the last two verses) - it has always stayed with me from the time I first read it in high school.

The Highwayman, copyrighted 1906, 1913 By Alfred Noyes

And still of a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,
A highwayman comes riding-
Riding-riding-
A highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.


Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-yard,
And he taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked and barred;
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter,
Bess, the landlord's daughter,
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.