DEAD POETS: Rime of the Ancient Mariner

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Come in my friends! You are in the Fo'c's'le Inn and Tavern, the most convivial location in Anvil if not all Colovia, where a weary sailor or landsman can bend an elbow for a draught of honest brew and the warm and friendly company of your lovely hostess Mirabelle Monet.

While you relax and shed the cares and fatigue of your busy day I'll riffle the courses of my lute and keep time with my foot and recite the story of Norbert Lelles, his small and simple store and the stranger things from far lands and stranger shores that come to rest upon his simple shelves. 'Tis a long tale and I will likely need my mug topped off and a septim or two in the jar on the bar before I'm through. 

THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER

Canto the First - The Ancient Mariner

Anvil's western sky was a-flame

Death-fires a dancing in the light

The water like a witch's oils

Burning green, and blue and white

On his step there stood a mariner

Norbert feared that skinny hand

A specter long and deathly pale

As is ribbed white sea-sand

His lips were pale, his looks were fey

His locks and beard were grey

His skin was white as leprosy

A night-mare life in death was he,

His veins had blood with cold

"My store is closed" quoth Norbert

But the mariner took the key

"By thy pale hand and glittering eye,

now wherefore stop thou me?" 

Canto the Second - The Voyage

He pointed to the harbor main,

Where age like hoar-frost spread;

And there a ship's ghost shadow lay,

"Tis the Pasquiniel" 'twas what the mariner said.

Her Pilot's name was Illio

And with others they made three

Cleared to leave their Firsthold Port

To find Old Ehlnofey

For eighty moons the ships to search