The ballad of Beren & Luthien

The next poem appears on page 191 of the 50th anniversary edition of The Lord of the Rings.

Hiding on the lowest corner of a dell the hobbits and Strider stop after a full day of walking. There they lit a fire and prepare a frugal supper.
With the idea of keeping the hobbits' minds far from fear Strider starts telling them some tales. One of them is the famous tale of Beren and Luthien. The epic love story between a mortal man and an inmortal elven maid which poem he sung as a song:

Luthien was the daughter of Thingol (elven king of Doriath) and Melian the Maia (demigod in Tolkien's legendarium). She was an elf of incomparable beauty and grace. It was said that her voice would suffice to turn winter into spring.
Beren on the other hand was a man of the house of Bëor. His father fought in the Dagor Bagollach (the battle of the sudden flame) and was pursued because of this by Sauron. After a betrayal all men of the company were killed except for Beren, who spent countless days hunting the orcs responsible.
Being forced to flee he ended up into the realm of Doriath where he encountered Luthien. She was elusive and winter had to pass before he could be able to see her again and make an approach.
They quickly fell in love but Thingol, her father, refused to give the hand of his only daughter unless Beren would be able to recover a Silmaril from Morgoth's crown.
After many perils the couple managed to fulfill that impossible task but in the end they had to confront the great wolf Carcharoth who left Beren mortally wounded.
Luthien love for Beren was so strong that she died herself (even though she was an inmortal elf).
In the afterlife her prayers were so strong that they both were brought back to life, but they would live now a mortal life.
They lived apart from other mortals, so no one really knows how this story ends.
One can only be sure that they stayed together until the end of their days.

Regarding the song it took some time to complete as it was like a jigsaw trying to smoothly connect all the chords and melodies while following the highs and lows of the story..
The cherry on the top is the last section which grew unintentionally and finally became an homage to 80s hard rock ballads to celebrate how love triumphed even over death.

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