The Jersey Devil

The "Jersey Devil's" legend continues since the story of its existence remains part of the Pine Barrens heritage.  Some might say it is simply folklore, while others believe the creature continues to roam the sandy roads of the pinelands.  There have been reliable individuals including police, and others who have reported witnessing an animal like being reportedly having wings, a horse's head, horns, and cloven hooves.  All documented reports seem to differ, but he never has been depicted as a natural human being.  The Jersey Devil was born to a woman known as Mother Leeds.  It supposedly was her 13th child, and since she grew tired of children she wished it to be a devil.  And so the legend begins! 

 She cursed the day she and Leeds were wed.

Heavy with life she held her head

and cried to the midwife, silent and grim,

"Twelve children I have given him!

Still young, I am old, and sick with wear.

Twelve hungry mouths, twelve burdens to bear!

I was fair and strong when the banns were read,

with velvet cheek and flaxen head,

sparkling eye and silken of limb,

but I had to go and marry him!

What would I give to escape this life ---

to have no pain, be no man's wife,

no children to tend, no chores to be done,

to be young once again, to have some fun!

Oh what I would give to end this birth,

This horrible night weight, this obscene girth!

I'd like to bear the Devil's child --

all claw and fang, all fierce and wild --

Such sweet revenge to Leed's face

when he finds a beast in the baby's place."

The wood fire leaped and began to crackle,

the room was filled with a demon crackle.

The woman screamed, and the quiet returned.

In the dim, still room her pale eyes burned.

She shivered and shook with fear and dread.

"I didn't mean it, those things I said."

"Hush my dear," the midwife said,

"Your labor's begun, best go back to bed."

The woman writhed on her dank, soiled cot.

The fire blazed and the room grew hot.

It bathed the walls in a hellish red.

The midwife swabbed her damp forehead

and drew the child from its mother's womb.

A hideous shriek ripped through the room.

A claw shot out and scratched the cheek

of the midwife now to numb to speak.

It slashed and tore, and left her dead,

Then turned, and lifting its horse-like head,

gave a sanguine smile to its mother there,

a giggling idiot, twisting her hair,

her youth regained, but to no avail.

It stroked her face with its serpentine tail,

gave a practice shrug of each leathery wing,

then flew up the chimney in one spring.

Now it prowls the pines in the damp of night,

when a gibbous moon spends its sickly light,

A child of darkness who leaves in the sand,

A cloven hoofprint, the mark of a hand,

a broken branch, or a claw...who knows?

But the wise pinewoods man never goes

alone in the Barrens late at night.

He fears the heron's azure flight;

avoids the red orchid, passes it by;

leaves it to suckle the carrion fly;

starts at the sudden crack of a twig.

 

Something is moving there----something big!

There are charms to be carried. Don't tempt the fates.

The Jersey Devil watches and waits!

 

And so the legend continues...