1
Drummer beat and piper blow,
Harper strike and soldier go.
Free the flame and sear the grasses,
'Till the dawning Red Star passes.
2
From the Weyr and from the Bowl,
Bronze and brown and blue and green,
Rise the dragonmen of Pern,
Aloft, on wing, seen, then unseen.
3
Honour those the dragons heed,
In thought and favour, word and deed.
Worlds are lost and worlds are saved
From those dangers dragon-braved.
4
Dragonmen, avoid excess;
Greed will bring the Weyr distress;
To the ancient Laws adhere,
Prospers thus the Dragonweyr.
5
The Hold is barred,
The Hall is bare,
    And men vanish.
The soil is barren,
The rock is bald,
    All hope banish.
6
Watch-wher, watch-wher,
In your lair,
Watch well, watch-wher!
Who goes there?
7
Lord of the Hold, your charge is sure
In thick walls, metal doors, and
   no venure.
8
By the Golden Egg of Faranth
By the Weyrwoman, wise and true,
Breed a flight of bronze and brown
   wings,
Breed a flight of green and blue.
Breed riders, strong and daring,
Dragon-loving, born as hatched
Flight of hundreds soaring skyward,
Man and dragon fully matched.
9
Seas boil and mountains move,
Sands heat, dragons prove
Red Star passes.
Stones pile and fires burn,
Green whithers, arm Pern.
Guard all passes.
Star Stone watch, scan sky.
Ready the Weyrs, all riders fly;
Red Star passes.
10
Dragonman, dragonman,
Between thee and thine,
Share me that glimpse of love
Greater than mine.
11
The Finger points
At an Eye blood-red.
Alert the Weyrs
To sear the Thread.
12
Rise high in glory,
Bronze and gold.
Dive entwined,
Enhance the Hold.
13
Count three months and more,
And five heated weeks,
A day of glory and
In a month, who seeks?
14
A strand of silver
In the sky...
With heat, all quickens
And all times fly.
15
Weyrman, watch; Weyrman, learn
Something new in every Turn.
Oldest may be coldest, too.
Sense the right; find the true!
16
Crack dust, blackdust,
Turn in freezing air.
Waste dust, spacedust,
From Red Star bare.
17
Wheel and turn
Or bleed and burn.
Fly Between,
Blue and green.
Soar, dive down,
Bronze and brown.
Dragonmen must fly,
When Threads are in the sky.
18
Weaver, Miner, Harper, Smith,
Tanner, Farmer, Herdsman, Lord
Gather, wingsped, listen well
To the Weyrman's urgent word.
19
Black, blacker, blackest,
And cold beyond frozen things.
Where is Between when there is naught
To Life but fragile dragon wings?
20
Cold as death, death-bearing,
Stay and die, unguided,
Brave and braving, linger.
This way was twice decided.
21
Oh, tounge, give sound to joy and sing
Of hope and promise on dragonwing.
22