A Traveller's Warning

The flowers hang with weariness
across the stones of yesterday,
trailing their dank green petals o'er
the rocks wounds in frozen play.
All weary rest the angels heads
with their songbooks all of moss
and their cowls that'll ne'er be lifted
from their stance of woe and loss.
The crypt gate creeks and chatters
in every biting winter gale
in the darkness when the moonlight
makes the gravestones wan and pale.
Here in the midnight hour did pause
a traveller on his way,
from town to town he'd trudged alone
from good St.Stephens day.
In haste he wished to pass along
and not thinking to be frightened
he took the winding graveyard path
that the moon has never brightened.
He passed the worn down angels
with the ivy all embraced
he passed the words of sadness
and the headstones all displaced.
He was almost past the crypt until
the crows cry on the air
made him stop and for a second
look round to see her there
A pale face like a lily flower
met his anxious searching eye
and with a pale white finger
she  gestured with a sigh
for him to come and meet her
and take her hand a while,
she brushed her dark hair coyly
and gave a red-lipped smile.
A stranger in the midnight
saw the moonbeams gentle glimmer
which played upon her pretty eyes
and made her beauty shimmer,
and though the crypt door rang alarms
he hardly seemed to heed it
for he took her hand so swiftly
as if god himself decreed it.
She brought his lips close to her
and looked deep into his eyes,
they seemed as black as midnight
and he gasped out his surprise
but her smile became more feral
and her grip became so tight
that though he tried to get away
it was a fruitless fight.
The angels dropped their raindrop tears
the wind wailed out its mourning
for the traveller found so lifeless
in the frosty winter dawning,
His face pale as a lily
with two rosebuds on his neck
an eery clothing bundle
even ravens wouldn't peck.
The darkness holds the secrets fast
that the daylight must condemn
for those who walk in moonlight
must fear who'll come for them.