Sit down on that stool, hear the cant of a fool
And a strange tale I’ll impart to ye
Of a time that I lived at the buff of a hill
‘Neath the burial chambers you see

One Saturday night, I get up on me bike
For to go to a dance in the town
I set off at seven to be there for eleven
No thought of the rain comin’ down

I pushed up the hill, the rain started to spill
So for shelter I had to resort
Helter-skelter I went as downhill I sped
To the trees at the old fairy fort

I pulled up me bike, be a tree in the gripe
To find shelter out of the storm
The rain it came down and like stones beat the ground
It was grand to be dry in that storm

I was dreamin’ away about better days
When a voice, it says, “Dirty old night”
I fell over me bike, I got such a fright
When the ghostly voice bid me the night

But you jumped up with a start, gave the storm not a thought
As the hail beat a rhythm on me
And I stared at the tree that had spoken to me
Not a body was there I could see

I trembled and shook the tree, twisted and booked
As the wind got into a scream
And I grabed for me bike in that devil’s owned night
Expecting to wake from a dream

The voice I had heard, not another word said
As the hair on the head stood on me
And I said an “Our Father” as I peddled much faster
Away from that ghost haunted tree

For weeks and weeks after with nerves a disaster
Nowhere near that road would I go
And from dusk through the night I would shake with the fright
Of the tree that had haunted me so

Now, whenever I go to a dance in the town
I make sure not to stop on the way
To be there for eleven, I still leave at seven
But I go by a different way

– Terry Woods/The Pogues, Haunting, 1993

stencil graffiti; Ann Arbor, MI