Witch-Burning

They burned a witch in Bingham Square
 Last Friday afternoon.
The faggot-smoke was blacker than
 The shadows on the moon;
The licking flames were strangely green
 Like fox-fire on the fen...
And she who cursed the godly folk
 Will never curse again.
They burned a witch in Bingham Square;
 Before the village gate.
A huswife raised a skinny hand
 To damn her, tense with hate.
A huckster threw a jagged stone—
 Her pallid cheek ran red...
But there was something scornful in
 The way she held her head.
They burned a witch in Bingham Square;
 Her eyes were terror-wild.
She was a slight, a comely maid,
 No taller than a child.
They bound her fast against the stake
 And laughed to see her fear...
Her red lips muttered secret words
 That no one dared to hear.
They burned a witch in Bingham Square—
 But ere she swooned with pain
And ere her bones were sodden ash
 Beneath the sudden rain,
She set her mark upon that throng...
 For time can not erase
The echo of her anguished cries,
 The memory of her face.
Category:Horror
Category:Poems
Category:Library Archive/PD