To drive the dark away by song and dance,
knowing that year always follows year,
renews itself in Nature’s wise sequence
though light and life may seem to disappear;
to make hope come alive through revelry.
That is our work, what folk have always done
against the dark, an ancient certainty
that’s still as true as every morning sun.
Now a different kind of darkness comes,
a different kind of dragon, hard to slay.
But we have instruments of joy and drums
and choral song, laughter and poetry.
There is no danger these cannot outlast.
We will go on; this darkness, too, shall pass.
-Richard Lewis
Founder
Portland Revels
