How it began

Way,, way back... oops, that's Joseph. Anyway, it wasn't many centuries ago. It was around 2007 I think. I was writing a series of fantasy poetry in different formats. One of the poems was about a changeling; but this wasn't a child left by the fairies to replace a human. It was a human child raised by the fairies. I called it Willow Willow. As with a lot of my pieces, it tells a story and has a refrain. This story is complete in itself, but the theme and subject matter kept returning to my mind, and finally I decided to write a novel. As if my wont, I wrote a lot and it got too long, but it is finally being published as a three-part series.
The storyline is different from the poem's, but both deal with a declining people and their fatalism as their time draws to its close. Garlands of Thorn and May has a much more hopeful ending, though. 

 
Willow, Willow
The child we found by the hawthorn hedge
was a sleeping son all wrapped in cloth
of a foreign weave with scallops on the edge.
 We thought him a babe someone had lost
so we left a sign by the hawthorn hedge
and we brought him home to a cradle in the moss.
Oh, willow, willow, oaken rod
Keep the secrets of the sod.
 Our fosterling grew lithe and strong
as he played with the sons of the hollow hills
and learned the lore and the rites of oaken song.
 These lonely hours were kindly filled
while our thoughts were soft and our hopes grew long
and we almost touched the destiny we willed.
Oh, willow, willow, ashen staff,
Hold the magic of the hearth.
 We waited three times seven years,
for the claim of a one who shared his blood
in the world beyond which flows with wasted tears.
 We gave him worth and he taught us love,
but we could not shape his human fears
so we lost him when the hawthorns came to bud.
Oh, willow, willow, thornwood wand,
Hold the lore and keep the bond.
 When hawthorns misted leafy spires
a village daughter passed our gates
and our fosterling was drawn in human guise.
 We fared him well (for it was too late)
and we saw her smile and we saw his eyes;
now we must accept our hopes were doomed by fate.
 Oh, willow, willow, rowan bough,
Keep our secrets for us now.
 The fair folks' blood grows thin and weak
while our ailing kind is fading fast.
In three times seven years we had time to speak
To our changeling son of the gloried past,
when the fair folks' sway reached a silver peak...
but he's gone and we know our time must end at last. 
Oh, willow, willow, leaf and bark...
Save our secrets from the dark;
Willow, willow, never tell
Oh, willow, willow – keep him well.