Billy

Billy came in sixteen ninety-three,
With a patched-up coat and a crooked key.
He knew the lanes where the old
Mill stood, and vanished one night
By the edge of the wood.
Oh, Billy, where did you go?
No one knows, no one knows.
When October winds begin to moan,
Billy comes back to walk us home.
The church bell counted the midnight
Hour, the leaves lay
Thick by the ruined tower.
His footprints stopped at a stone-cold
Stream, and the village kept asking
What it could mean.
Oh, Billy, where did you go?
No one knows, no one knows.
When October winds begin to moan,
Billy comes back to walk us home.
On Halloween when the lamps burn
Low, a shape in the lane moves slow,
So slow.
With graveyard
Dirt on his Sunday shoes,
He tips his hat like
He's come for the news.
Oh, Billy, where did you go?
No one knows, no one knows.
Each Halloween, he finds his way home,
A laughing dead boy,
Never alone.
Billy, Billy, the old years roll.
Still you come when the pumpkins glow.