She came to Gully’s Run with ribbons in her hair,
A dream of love, a life laid bare.
A house of timber, a heart of stone,
She built a world she’d never leave alone.

The land was cruel, the winters long,
The river hummed a mourning song.
One child fevered, the next one drowned,
A husband buried in frozen ground.

Yet still she stayed, she would not break,
For love was something she could not forsake.
She held them close, she kept them near,
And when death came, she kept them here.

The walls grew quiet, the house stood still,
The cradle rocked though the air was chill.
One by one, the voices dimmed,
But love was bound within the limbs.

A floorboard lifted, the earth below,
A secret grave no wind would know.
She kissed their brows, she laid them deep,
And whispered, “Hush, my loves, go back to sleep.”

The noose was tied, the verdict read,
She faced the gallows with nothing said.
But even as the rope pulled tight,
Her breath still lingers in the night.

For the wind still wails through Gully’s Run,
And the house still hums when the day is done.
A mother’s grief, a lover’s sin,
A name scratched deep in the howling wind.