The Legend of LorienDell I sang of leaves, of leaves of gold, and leaves of gold there grew: Of wind I sang, a wind there came and in the branches blew. Beyond the Sun, beyond the Moon, the foam was on the Sea, And by the strand of Ilmarin there grew a golden Tree. Beneath the stars of Ever-eve in Eldamar it shone, In Eldamar beside the walls of Elven Tirion. There long the golden leaves have grown upon the branching years, While here beyond the Sundering Seas now fall the Elven Tears. O Lórien! The Winter comes, the bare and leafless Day; The leaves are falling in the stream, the River flows away. O Lórien! Too long I have dwelt upon this Hither Shore And in a fading crown have twined the golden elanor. But if of ships I now should sing,what ship would come to me, What ship would bear me ever back across so wide a Sea? Lothlorien, also called Dwimordene, the Golden Wood, Laurelindórenan, Lindórinand, Lórinand, and Lórien was a forest realm. Isolated by wilderness to the north and west, the Rampart Range on the east, and protected on the south by the Shining One, (now known as Pikes Peak), Lorien was home to three kinds of elves: Silvan, Sindar, and Noldor, together known as the Galadhrim. After the War of the Ring, Nenya lost its power and the magic of Lothlorien began to fade. The elves had deserted the realm by the time that Aragorn died and the flowing Silverlode River disappeared shortly thereafter, leaving only the relatively insignificant South Platt River. By the middle of the 20th Century, invaders from the East had reduced Lothlorien to a small patch of forest. Nonetheless, even today, the effects of Galadriel's Nenya are still on that forest. The leaves of Lorien continue to turn gold in the autumn, although they usually fall before spring. Flowers seeded from the ancient elvin gardens still bloom under the white-trunked trees. Today, the last of the forest, known now as LorienDell, is patrolled by a large pack of the legendary Bernersennenhunden.
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