Written for the Guardian challenge; Dumbledore's death in the style of...another author.
Dumbledore's Death in the style of Longfellow;
Listen my
children and you shall hear
Of Dumbledore's death and shed a
tear
On the sixth of October in ninety-five
Hardly witch nor
wizard is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.
He said to
staunch Filch, " If Deatheaters march
By land or lake to
Hogwarts to-night
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
Of
the Hogwarts Tower as a signal light, --
One if by land, and two
if by lake,
And I on the opposite shore will wait,
Ready to fly
and raise the alarm
To save Harry Potter from Voldemort's harm,
To
save all the children with protection charms."
Then he said,
"Good-night!" and with a soft "poof"
Quietly
vanished from castle roof,
Just as the moon rose over the
trees,
Something softly rustled in the breeze
The Womping
Willow, stately and grim,
A phantom shadow, with each branch and
limb
Across the moon like a fiendish whim
And a huge black
trunk, that was characterized
By gnarls and burls of unearthly
size.
Meanwhile, loyal
Filch from high castle walls
Wanders and watches, listens in
halls,
Till in the silence around him it falls
The sound of
Deatheaters far off in flight
The swish of robes, and the throb of
hate,
And the malevolence in the atmosphere,
Fearlessly they
approach on the night.
Then he climbed
the tower of Hogwarts Castle,
By the secret stairs, with stealthy
tread,
To the belfry chamber overhead,
And startled sweet
Fawkes from his perch
On the somber rafters, that round him
made
Masses and moving shapes of shade, --
Yet onward and
upward, he did crawl
To the highest window in the wall,
Where
he paused to listen and look down
To the glistening lake far
below
And the moonlight flowing over all.
Beneath, on the
grounds, the Willow stood,
In its sentinel pose on the
hill,
Wrapped in silence so deep and still
That he could hear,
like a whispered breath
The watchful night-wind, soft as
death
Creeping along the castle's breadth,
And seeming to
whisper, "All is well!"
A moment only he feels the
spell
Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread
Of the
lonely belfry and is misled;
For suddenly all his thoughts are
bent
On the shadowy something out of sight,
Where swiftly flies
on the wings of the night, --
Far off a movement soft
belies
Villainous fiends who on the night-wind ride.
Meanwhile,
impatient to face the tide
Of evil forces, with heavy stride
On
the opposite shore paced Dumbledore.
Now he patted his beard
down,
Now he gazed at the landscape 'cross the shore,
Then,
impatiently, paced anon,
And turned and fingered his waiting
wand;
But mostly he watched with eager eye
The tower silhouette
against the sky,
As it rose far above the castle dark,
Lonely
and spectral and sombre and stark.
And lo! as he looks, on the
belfry's height
A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!
He nods
mute acceptance, the hour is near,
He lingers and gazes, till full
on his sight
A second lamp flickers bright and clear.
Then standing
before the grey grizzled mage,
A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in
the dark,
And flashing, in the darkness, a glinting, a
spark
Reflecting the moonlight in eyes filled with rage;
That
was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light,
The fate of all
wizards hung suspended that night;
And between two lonely figures,
wrong or right,
Destiny set the last scene on the stage.
"So
at last, Dumbledore, the moment is here",
Said the figure,
"Do you tremble with fear?"
Said Dumbledore, meeting the
baleful stare,
"I fear no foul blackguard of evil design;
I
beg you, relent; the triumph is mine."
And drawing his wand,
he brought it to bear.
It was twelve
midnight on the stroke
When the first blue flash cut through the
darkness.
The dark wizard just twitched his cloak
And
Dumbledore's strike fell to the ground
Where it withered with a
hissing sound,
Disabled and rendered harmless.
The next
instance a double flash
Filled the air with brilliant blinding
light.
They say that the deafening blast
Was heard and felt for
miles that night.
Not one trace of Dumbledore was found
Just
two marks upon the ground,
One black, one white,
Indelibly
inscribed in the shore for all to see
Where two wizards came to
face their destinies.
