Bride of the Vampire

 

by Brett Rutherford

After a ballad by Felix Dahn

Gladly would I, as the other
     dead, my grave in quiet keep;
Yet a curse, a ban eternal
     makes me roam while mortals sleep.

Peaceful in the azure moonbeams
     stand the vaults where others rest,
yet I, beneath my marble tombstone,
     a burning pang within my breast

flow out and up, my dusty pinions
     shaking as they set me free,
over hill and dale to wander,
     unslaked yearnings driving me

to where my tender bride reposes,
     in her dreams of a living lover.
I will hover, bat and shadow,
     lightly falling from above her.

Now my black eyes, forever open
     lock on her closed orbs, lashed shut;
now the candle flickers lower
     as my wing-beat snuffs it out. 

I nearly faint from undead passion,
     yet from here I cannot go.
She must join me ’ere the sunrise
     join me in the realms below!

Well she knows my bite’s destruction.
     Twice have I been here and gone.
In vain, in vain, the others warned her;
     outside they pray, and watch for dawn.

Slowly I feed, and take my pleasure,
     vein to lips, and blood to throat.
Now I press the fatal signet
     upon her breast, Undead,

unblessed, unsoul’d, unmourned,
I carry her off on night’s last zephyr,
so pale, so cold, forever-more.
Only an empty bed discover’d,

a drop of blood upon the floor,
a taper snuff’d, an unread prayer,
the garland of protective herbage,
the crucifix she shunned to wear.

Now hark! Beware! The cock is crowing.
     They are calling out her name!
And though she whispers, “Father! Mother!”
     She is far beyond their finding,

Back into my grave I burrow,
     sliding aside my marble roof.
At sunset, on the hungry morrow,
     side by side we’ll issue forth.