I have waited, and I have wandered;
And I have wondered so much—
Is it true that in the ice graves
There rests a maiden with white charcoal eyes?
Is it true that her frozen tears melt
The hearts of all who look upon her,
Yet not the walls of her winter tomb?
That crown of barbed wire,
Is it still upon her head?—
When I saw her last she was fair;
Tell me, are the lilies still in her hair?

So I heard, it is said, the ice maiden is no longer dead:
She has awoken from her ever-long slumber
And with restored life walks the earth—
Leaving a trail of chills and cold,
Of ice and snow it clings to her.
The spirit sings a winter lullaby,
She sings of sisters met in death—
A dirge for Annabel Lee, who was the first she met.
The white-haired girl sings an opera melody
In memory of poor young Skene’s wife,
Whose ghost sits up on the rounded tower still.

With pain and mournful sighs
She seeks long-forgotten memories;
So it is I have only been told— I have not seen,
I have not heard her death chants,
The elegy she sings for black-eyed Bess.
I have not heard her own lamenting tale;
We all only know of her regrets
Her sorrows she openly shares yet
No one knows, no one knows except the man—
That man in black for whom she sings—
The man with no face, no heart, and no story.