A MOLE LIVED ON A MOUNTAIN
A mole lived on a mountain.
His banjo, it was blue.
He sang of a crystal fountain
That welled from beneath a yew.
And it was in the fall of the year
That his banjo, it was blue.
As the old mole sang, he shed a tear
For Lily of the Valley.
And it was in the fall of the year
That he sang, "O waly, walley,
My love, she lives in a far, far land,
My Lily of the Valley."
He sailed for a desert island
With his banjo all of blue.
He sang, "My love's in a far, far land —
"Alas! that she never knew
A mole lived on a mountain
Whose love for her was true,
Who sang of her crystal fountain."
This terzanelle was originally published in Phantasm, iii:6, issue 18, 1978, and gathered in The Collected Lyrics of Lewis Turco / Wesli Court 1953-2004, Scottsdale, AZ: www.StarCloudPress.com, 2004, 460 pp., ISBN 1-932842-00-4, jacketed cloth; ISBN 1-932842-01-2, trade paperback. May not be reproduced without written permission of the author.
