And so into the Aureate West...

Tanith Lee 19th September 1947 - 24th May 2015

Portrait by Dallas C. Goffin
(From a photograph by Jerry Bauer)

Something momentous and devastating happened on Sunday 24th May - the Mistress of Delirium, Tanith Lee, passed away. I find it almost impossible to express how much her work has affected me over the 30 or so years I have been reading and absorbing it's richness. I won't attempt to do that at the moment, but I will share the following piece which was written in June 1987 and published in Aklo (edited by Mark Valentine & Roger Dobson) Autumn 1992. At the time the dedication to Tanith didn't appear, so I'd like to correct that now.

 

Dreamer's Soliloquy  

(Dedication: Tanith Lee 1947-2015)

 

I shall draw the night from out the west,

And wrap it about like a cloak;

I will coax dim shadows from haunted woods,

And plume my hair with their smoke.

I shall take the moon from the curving sky,

And hammer it into searing cold rings;

Take the burning gems of the sunset

to set on their circlings.

I shall pluck the fruit of the pewter stars

And let them flash upon my opal lips;

Take wild perfumes from midnight blooms

Let fragrance flow from fingertips.

 

I shall weave the mists beneath sombre trees

And dance with the moonlit wind

Gather the roses on the tressle of dawn,

To which the gold silk sun is pinned.

I shall slip my hands into gloves of frost,

And envelope my feet in deep thunder

Enpearl my face in the falling rain;

Then rest amidst this wonder... and rest amid this wonder.