Eight Harvard Poets/Qui Sub Luna Errant

QUI SUB LUNA ERRANT

IN a strange land they dwell, too far away
From sunlight and the common mirth of men
Ever to come within our casual ken.
We see them not, but if by chance we stray
Down cypress aisles when the wan summer day
Draws to a thin and sickly close, we hear
Murmur of mad speech by some watery weir
Or languid laughter and faint sound of play.

They never see the dawn; like the pale moths
That haunt lugubrious shadows of dim trees
They celebrate their lunar mysteries
At woodland shrines, where with green thyrsus rods
And weak limbs wrapped in silken sensuous cloths
They chant the names of their dead pagan gods.