Gallowbraid
Ashen Eidolon

Tracklist

• 1. Ashen Eidolon (14:38)
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  I remember sunlight dancing across her face
  Patterns in my mind, gently etched in gold and amber
  The warmth of summer riding sweetly on her breath
  A warmth recalled only in memories of halcyon yesterdays
  
  Now summer has ended and the warmth is gone
  Nothing but a braid on the gallows trees remains to mark her passing
  In autumn's wake, sorrow took her as its own
  My heart was buried with her there beneath the bleeding oak
  
  She died alone in that mournful glade
  No comfort sought nor gained in hateful solitude
  She flew on wings as black as seething night
  Oh where was I, thou blighted, cursed wood?
  
  Gold and ochre
  Behold the tapestry of the fall
  There is a beauty
  A certain subtle grandeur
  In the withering that consumes us all
  
  Among the sightless trunks and boughs
  Bare feet upon forgotten soil paths
  The leaves blind to her desperate plight
  
  Yet ravens watched from every branch
  And witnessed mute her final fall
  With solemn caws they called her dead
  And flew into the granite sky
  
  Time fades away yet sorrow remains
  
  And as her final song she sang:
  I will fade as night conquers day.
  I am the ashen eidolon,
  the deepest shade of grey.
  
  She shuddered with the flaming leaves
  Her veins spat golden gouts of burning life
  That swirled upward against the pouring rain
  Which came down hard as iron coffin nails
  It splintered wooden limbs and shattered stone
  And pounded on her lifeless, paling corpse
  It gave her leave of what she could no longer bear
  And forged for her a gilded tomb
• 2. Autumn I (04:23)
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  Instrumental
• 3. Oak and Aspen (11:23)
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  I close my eyes and hear the stream as it passes
  Moments lost to whims of time
  Held close by the embrace of aspens
  Wrought through with a sorrow I cannot define
  I breathe in the autumn air
  And lift my face to the sky
  All I hear are echoes of despair
  As I watch the seasons wither and die
  
  Do the oaks feel this distant pain?
  Can the pines offer me relief?
  Have the aspens wept with the rain?
  Does the forest know this untouchable grief?
  
  Now I wander on forever
  Down these oaken halls of sorrow
  Seeking solitude in the autumn months
  Through days so long and hollow
  Fallen leaves pave the path I walk
  Barren branches lead the way
  Bringing shelter from the sun
  And days so far away
  
  The beauty of this forest sings to me
  Through words of wind and verse of falling leaves
  Its song is one of sorrow and days long past
  The time is gone but the memories always last
  
  For all this time I have been searching
  For why the skies are grey
  All colour lost to time and sorrow
  The sun put out by pain
  As autumn leaves keep on dancing
  And pay no heed to me
  My journey through these wild landscapes
  Is all that I have left
  
  I come across a quiet river
  That wanders through the trees
  I stare into its running waters
  And fall onto my knees
  In resignation to the forest
  That's held me for so long
  I close my eyes and drift away
  Into nature's evensong
• 4. Autumn II (01:18)
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  Instrumental
Duration: 31:42