by Eugene Field (1850 - 1895)
Sleep, little pigeon, and fold your...
Language: English
Sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings, — Little blue pigeon with velvet eyes; Sleep to the singing of mother-bird swinging — Swinging the nest where her little one lies. Away out yonder I see a star, — Silvery star with a tinkling song; To the soft dew falling I hear it calling — Calling and tinkling the night along. In through the window a moonbeam comes, — Little gold moonbeam with misty wings; All silently creeping, it asks, "Is he sleeping — Sleeping and dreaming while mother sings?" Up from the sea there floats the sob Of the waves that are breaking upon the shore, As though they were groaning in anguish, and moaning — Bemoaning the ship that shall come no more. But sleep, little pigeon, and fold your wings, — Little blue pigeon with mournful eyes; Am I not singing? — see, I am swinging — Swinging the nest where my darling lies.
C. Stanford sets stanzas 1-3, 5
A. Somervell sets stanzas 1-3, 5
About the headline (FAQ)
View text with all available footnotesConfirmed with Eugene Field, Poems of Childhood, New York, C. Scribner's Sons, 1904, page 19.
Text Authorship:
- by Eugene Field (1850 - 1895), "Little Blue Pigeon", first published 1892 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Alicia Adélaïda Needham (1863 - 1945), "Little blue pigeon", published 1897 [ voice and piano ], from An Abum of Twelve Hush Songs, no. 2, London : Boosey & Co. [sung text not yet checked]
- by Arthur Somervell, Sir (1863 - 1937), "Sleep Little Pigeon", published 1892, stanzas 1-3,5 [ voice and piano ], J & J Hopkinson [sung text checked 1 time]
- by Charles Villiers Stanford, Sir (1852 - 1924), "A Japanese Lullaby", published 1918, stanzas 1-3,5 [ unison chorus or voice and piano ], Edward Arnold (unison song) ; Cramer (voice and piano) [sung text checked 1 time]
Researcher for this page: Christopher Howell
This text was added to the website: 2020-10-11
Line count: 20
Word count: 156