A Night By a Lake

A round bright moon glowed low in the night sky throwing silver pennies onto rippling water, A nightingale sang a beautiful haunting tune accompanied by a sedge warbler a nighttime bird, I listened to a song thrush singing from the upper branches of a haggard, horny old oak tree, Earlier before the light had nearly gone a redbreast bathed in the lake always his last chore. I sat outside on this warm summer night the twilight showed me shadows of monsters and beasts, An old lime tree like a thief in the night creeping up on me as the sun sank and the moon rose, Noises from the forest sounded like madmen that had escaped running in chains I looked around, Twigs, dry branches snapped then a hurried rustle, was the forest haunted like the locals say. Popping open a bottle of ginger beer sounded as loud as a hiss of a sidewinder rattlesnake, Crunching a biscuit was as loud a huge avalanche of snow sliding fast down a huge mountainside, Eating my peanuts I thought an army of soldiers were marching at the back of my wooden cabin, I tried to think what creeps about in the dead of night making these noises, I wasn't scared. A small owl seldom hunts by day except in the spring when he becomes restless and excited, Little owls normally crepuscular and nocturnal rather than diurnal may sit on telegraph poles, The creatures of the dark creep out from their hiding places when night time covers the land, And a badger sits in a silent motionless vigil hiding having dug out an old wasp or bees nest. Sitting outside my cabin on the lake on a moonlit night you are last person left on this earth, There is rustling in the hedges and trees it is relaxing yet startling you are being watched, A gander of geese fly silhouetted past the huge bright moon on their way to warmer countries, My bottle of ginger beer nearly gone the same way as the biscuits I yawn and make my way to bed.