Rona In The Moon

Rona, Rona, sister olden,- Rona in the moon! You'll never break your prison golden,- Never, late or soon! Rona, for her crying daughter, At the dead of night Took the gourd and went for water; Went without a light. There she heard the owlets wrangle With an angry hoot; Stick and stone and thorny tangle Wounded Rona's foot. 'Boil the moon!' she said in passion; 'Boil your lazy head! Hiding thus in idle fashion In your starry bed!' Angry was the moon in heaven; Down to earth she came:- 'Stay you ever unforgiven For the word of shame! Up!- you made the moon a byword - Up and dwell with me!' Rona felt the drawing skyward,- Seized a ngaio tree. But from earth the ngaio parted Like a bitten thread; Like a comet upward darted Rona overhead. In the moon is Rona sitting Never to be free; With the gourd she held in flitting And the ngaio tree. You'll never break your prison golden,- Never, late or soon, Rona, Rona, sister olden, - Rona in the moon!