Goblin Feet
By J.R.R. Tolkien; Read by Kim Stich
1 |MP3| – Approx. 2 Minutes [POETRY]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published:
Written in April of 1915. First published in Oxford Poetry 1915.
Goblin Feet
by J.R.R. Tolkien
I AM off down the road
Where the fairy lanterns glowed
And the little pretty flittermice are flying :
A slender band of grey
It runs creepily away
And the hedges and the grasses are a-sighing.
The air is full of wings,
And of blundering beetle-things
That warn you with their whirring and their humming.
O ! I hear the tiny horns
Of enchanted leprechauns
And the padding feet of many gnomes a-coming !
O ! the lights : O ! the gleams : O ! the little tinkly sounds :
O ! the rustle of their noiseless little robes :
O ! the echo of their feet — of their little happy feet :
O ! their swinging lamps in little starlit globes.
I must follow in their train
Down the crooked fairy lane
Where the coney-rabbits long ago have gone,
And where silverly they sing
In a moving moonlit ring
All a-twinkle with the jewels they have on.
They are fading round the turn
Where the glow-worms palely burn
And the echo of their padding feet is dying !
O ! it’s knocking at my heart —
Let me go ! O ! let me start !
For the little magic hours are all a-flying.
O ! the warmth ! O ! the hum ! O ! the colours in the dark !
O ! the gauzy wings of golden honey-flies !
O ! the music of their feet — of their dancing goblin feet !
O ! the magic ! O ! the sorrow when it dies.
More good goblin badness:
Posted by Jesse Willis
There’s a reason Tolkien never reprinted this thing. A very good reason. :)
Oh, and of course it’s obvious from the poem, but at this stage Tolkien was using “goblin” as something of a synonym for “elf”. Hence the later insistence that orcs and goblins were descended from elves captured and genetically twisted by Morgoth. There’s probably a good chunk of influence from McDonald or from “fairy painters” here. (Definitely not C. Rossetti.)