Hello! It's been a little while since I've updated the site; it's been a bit of a busy year! Ive recently been involved with a fantastic community project bringing to life plays based on The Tempest, both as part of the writing team and as a script editor and actor (a completely new experience for me!). It's been a wonderful experience throughout and now that I've finally gotten around to it I would like to share with everyone a piece which I wrote for the third play 'The Book of Sycorax', a poem called 'Caliban's Lullaby'. This was put to music beautifully, composed and sung by the very talented Alastair Simpson and was a joy to watch performed. In the scene, the witch Sycorax uses her magic, calling upon all the elemental forces of the Island to help soothe her newborn baby Caliban to sleep. I hope you like it!
Caliban's Lullaby
Oh fiery child with fevered brow
who howls up such a hurricane,
I cast this spell to calm thine squall
and still the seas of sleep again.
Lay thy restless body down
upon the ground, thine eyes closed tight.
All the world’s a lullaby
to aid my love to dream tonight.
Gaia, guide me with thy hands
to carve in chalk my charméd art.
To root it deep like stony veins;
draw power from Earth’s beating heart.
Let loving embers ebb through rock.
A crag a cradle for his crown.
Enfold my infant in a nest
of limestone soft as thistledown.
I face the force of cliff crashed currents,
roaring riptides. Watery graves.
To turn the tide of Neptune’s wrath
to hushed sea breeze and whisp’ring waves.
Sing soft shanties to my son,
sweet guillemot and razorbill.
An echoed voice across the shoal
of silver water, shimm’ring. Still.
With strands of starlight woven twixt
I spin the softest lunar beams.
To cast a quilt upon my child
of velvet night and silken dreams.
My charm in the constellations
set in stars until next sunrise.
At last, he drifts off peacefully
into his own celestial skies.
(C) Eleanor Wallace 2023
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