The Haunted Belfry
Posted on July 7, 2007 - Filed Under Gothic Poetry
By George Klingle
What can the chimes be saying to-night,
Throbbing so low on the dying light?
Something they say, but I cannot tell
The secret words of their mystic spell—
Something they say, and to me it seems
Like the musical words of the sweetest dreams.
Oh! what can the chimes be saying to-night—
Throbbing so low on the dying light?
Long days ago and I saw him stand
With the tightened ropes in his dear old hand—
With the tightened ropes, at this very hour—
In the belfry, up in the Abbey tower;
I saw him stand, with locks of grey,
And his dim eyes bent on the parting day;
Ringing the bells out, one by one,
The Abbey bells, at the set of the sun;
And he smiled at the sounds as they floated on,
The sounds that echoed the hills along—
Drinking the music of every chime—
Drinking the music as men drink wine.
He tried to teach me the wonderful spells
Flung to the air by the old Abbey bells—
How the spirits of those who had chimed them before,
Came back to the belfry to chime them once more
And sob out their sorrows—or when all was well,
Chime softly and sweetly each loving old bell.
Aye, told me to come to the Abbey at night
When the old bells were throbbing at parting of light,
When his spirit had gone and he came back no more
From the chiming of bells to our own cottage door:
Aye, told me beside that he surely would come
To the belfry each night at the set of the sun.
Oh, what can the chimes, then, be saying to-night,
Throbbing so low on the dark dying light—
With the mystic words that I cannot tell—
Something they say and to me it seems
Like the musical words of the sweetest dreams.
From “Wood’s Household Magazine,” Nov. 1870.
