This is our time to remember By hearth-fire and welcome of bread So we gather and stand upon red leaves With a deep memory and love for our dead Under the chill of winter’s breath We give thanks to what was before Like the dormant life of the magical seed We await the springtime once more So lift high the lanterns living light The dark part of the year And sing our songs and celebrate For those who brought us here This ancient story of decay This earth on which we stand Of mud and stone And blood and bone So sacred be the land Green energy withdrawn Down in dark earth Down to the source and the core And the gusts of the wind Turn the wheel of the year Soon the lambs shake their tails once more So lift high the lanterns living light The dark part of the year And sing our songs and celebrate For those who brought us here We stand at the threshold between life and death The otherworld mist starts to clear And in the flickering shadows, born of the fire We see our ancestors appear