Rosabel

Beware of your heart, it's cruel and it's careless

More dangerous by far than the beasts in the wood

Beware wicked thoughts that come creeping and crawling

The shadow of dreams that can never come good

She's the talk of the town, the pride of the valley

Comes out with the sun and pours gold on the day

She knows all your names and smiles warm on your faces

But rosabel's wild as the briar in may

When each house lay asleep she's dropped from her window

In a blanket of darkness crept out of the town

And she' skipped up to faelen woods picking dog roses

No fear of the shadows that watched all around

She's plucked up her fill, and laughed in the moonshine

In warm summer's evening she's danced 'cross the moor

First twisting and turning, then tripping an falling

And lifeless she's lain on the heather bed floor

When she's woke up, a fire's hot glowing

She's tucked in silk sheets with lord john watching there

Saying "sleep, beauty sleep, lose your mind in warm dreaming

You're safe in my house and well mending with care"

In fever she's burned, but time's proved in healing

Made ready to leave but been blocked on the way

"Oh you thief you were wrong to go picking my roses!

And for stealing from me it's right he that you'll stay"

"Oh john you're so proud, and silent, and stubborn!

You're bigger than most and unkempt it is true

But I've grown fond of your ways and your quiet woodland keeping

And be I thief or no, I will stay here with you"

It's seven years gone, and seven years married

And seven slow years she's been counting the hours

"Oh my husband's uncomely and will not look on me

I long rue the day I went picking his flowers"

Now take heed young girls, here's rosa's undoing;

There's a diary she keeps of her sorrows and cares

If you write yourself down then you're asking for trouble

It's the nature of words to be read and be shared

One grey summer's morning she slipped into town

With excuses of shopping but for fresh company

Oh and who should be there but some boys from the army

And james the most charming in every degree

It isn't by chance he's strolled past her window

Nor by chance she's met him out walking alone

And they've tied up there love in the long july grasses

'Till with the steal dawn she's gone tiptoeing home

She's gone to the kitchen, but lord john's crept after

He's found her at writing and read just a few lines

Oh he rants and he rages and tears up the pages

And in the grief of betrayal she's fled from his cries

She's run for the woods, and he's tried to call after

But the chill death of heartbreak has stolen his moan

And she caught in the thorns of his wild dog roses

And there james has found her cold dead as the stone

Beware of your heart, it's cruel and it's careless

More dangerous by far than the beasts in the wood

Beware wicked thoughts that come creeping and crawling

The shadow of dreams that can never come good