Canto One ~ High above the encampment of Illian, near the inaccessible waterfalls men call The Psalms, Claire sings a last lament for her beloved grandfather lost in war. Her white robe and long hair struggle to reach him so far away, but Claire can only ponder the funeral pyre’s smoke so many miles away.

Canto One

She’s an image sleek of black and white.
A zephyr hurries east in flight
to bear a vanquished soul to rest.
Her silken robe would fain protest.

The swelling fabric left behind 5
as are the threads of locks entwined.

They cling to her and point the way
to bier smoke at break of day.
So far remote, as lace upon
the soft horizon of the dawn. 10

Its requiem is seeking God.

The passenger shall no more trod
these wide lands of the River Sea.
Deliverance, his spirit free,
Tur~C’arcontine, High King, is done. 15

Alone before the rising sun,
on cold, bare rock high in the mounts
from Laura west and nigh the founts
of waterfall men call The Psalms,
the Princess raises voice and palms 20
in lonely, final, sore farewell.

Her high lament appeals to quell
the desperate longing in her heart,
but has no solace to impart:

“I never saw you cry, 25
though often heard you sigh
above my bed,
you were instead
my first encircling sky,
but that was yesterday and now you’re gone. 30

Your laughter was to me
a song to oversee
awakening,
I heard you sing
and blossomed into me, 35
but that was yesterday and now you’re gone.
But that was yesterday and I’m alone.

I never stopped to think just what you meant to me ‘til now.
It seemed it all would last, but then you’re gone from me somehow.
And yet you’re not, 40
for in my heart
you’re singing to me now.

Remember yesterday when I was young?
It still is yesterday, my laughter’s sung.”