The wan witch at the creepy midnight hour,
When the wild moon was flying to its full,
Went huddling round a damned convent's tower,
From out the crumbling slabs or tombs to pull
Some lecherous leaf or shrieking mandrake-flower.
Beneath she heard the dead men's voices dull;
Around she felt the cold souls creep and cower;
In hand she held a grinning damned's skull! Then through the ruin'd cloisters, strangely white,
T'wards the struck moon, all swathed in colod grave-bands,
She saw dead Love wringing his hollow hands,
And gliding grimmer than a dank tomb-light. And with a shriek she rush'd across his path--
And now the hell-worm all her body hath!