by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928)
In the Moonlight
Language: English
'O lonely workman, standing there In a dream, why do you stare and stare At her grave, as no other grave there were? 'If your great gaunt eyes so importune Her soul by the shine of this corpse-cold moon Maybe you'll raise her phantom soon!' 'Why, fool, it is what I would rather see Than all the living folk there be; But alas, there is no such joy for me!' 'Ah -- she was one you loved, no doubt, Through good and evil, through rain and drought, And when she passed, all your sun went out? 'Nay: she was the woman I did not love, Whom all the others were ranked above, Whom during her life I thought nothing of.'
Authorship:
- by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928), "In the Moonlight", appears in Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries with Miscellaneous Pieces [author's text not yet checked 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 Betty Roe (b. 1930), "In the Moonlight", published 1993 [duet for mezzo-soprano and baritone with piano], from Satires of Circumstance, no. 6. [text verified 1 time]
Researcher for this page: Iain Sneddon [Guest Editor]
This text was added to the website: 2009-10-15
Line count: 15
Word count: 119