Had I the [heavens']1 embroidered cloths Enwrought with golden and silver light The blue and the dim and the dark cloths Of night and light and the half-light, I would spread the cloths under your feet: But I, being poor, have only my dreams; I have spread my dreams under your feet; Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.
Irish Lullabies
by Steven Ebel
1. Heavens' cloths  [sung text checked 1 time]
Authorship:
- by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), title 1: "Aedh wishes for the cloths of heaven", title 2: "He wishes for the cloths of heaven", appears in The Wind among the reeds, first published 1899 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- FRE French (Français) (Pierre Mathé) , copyright © 2015, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
- HUN Hungarian (Magyar) (Tamás Rédey) , copyright © 2015, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Original title is "Aedh wishes for the cloths of heaven"; revised 1906; re-titled "He wishes for the cloths of heaven".
Confirmed with W. B. Yeats, Later Poems, Macmillan and Co., London, 1926, page 45.
1 Gurney: "Heaven's"Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
2. An angel's lullaby  [sung text checked 1 time]
The angels are [stooping]1, above your bed; They weary of trooping with the whimpering dead. God's laughing in heaven to see you so good; The [Shining]2 Seven are gay with His mood. [I kiss you and kiss you, my pigeon my own. Ah how I shall miss you when you have grown.]3
Authorship:
- by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), "A cradle song", appears in The Rose, first published 1893 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- ITA Italian (Italiano) (Ferdinando Albeggiani) , "Una ninna nanna", copyright © 2012, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
First published in Scots Observer, April 1890; revised 1901
1 Grill: "singing"
2 Ebel, Grill: "Sailing"
3 Ebel: "I sigh that kiss you, for I must own/ That I shall miss you when you have grown."; Grill: "I sigh that kiss you, for I must own/ That I shall miss you when you have gone."
Research team for this text: Ted Perry , Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor]
3. Come away!  [sung text checked 1 time]
Where dips the rocky highland Of Sleuth Wood in the lake, There lies a leafy island Where flapping herons wake The drowsy water rats; There we've hid our faery vats, Full of berrys And of reddest stolen cherries. Come away, O human child! To the waters and the wild With a faery, hand in hand, For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. Where the wave of moonlight glosses The dim gray sands with light, Far off by furthest Rosses We foot it all the night, Weaving olden dances Mingling hands and mingling glances Till the moon has taken flight; To and fro we leap And chase the frothy bubbles, While the world is full of troubles And anxious in its sleep. Come away, O human child! To the waters and the wild With a faery, hand in hand, For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. Where the wandering water gushes From the hills above Glen-Car, In pools among the rushes That scarce could bathe a star, We seek for slumbering trout And whispering in their ears Give them unquiet dreams; Leaning softly out From ferns that drop their tears Over the young streams. Come away, O human child! To the waters and the wild With a faery, hand in hand, For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand. Away with us he's going, The solemn-eyed: He'll hear no more the lowing Of the calves on the warm hillside Or the kettle on the hob Sing peace into his breast, Or see the brown mice bob Round and round the oatmeal chest. For he comes, the human child, To the waters and the wild With a faery, hand in hand, For the world's more full of weeping than he can understand.
Authorship:
- by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), "The stolen child", first published 1886 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
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First published in Irish Monthly, December 1886.
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
4. An old song  [sung text checked 1 time]
[Sweetheart, do]1 not love too long: I loved long and long, And grew to be out of fashion Like an old song. All through the years of our youth Neither could have known Their own thought from the other's, We were so much at one. But O, in a minute [she]2 changed -- O do not love too long, Or [you will]3 grow out of fashion Like an old song.
Authorship:
- by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), "O do not love too long", appears in In the Seven Woods, first published 1904 [author's text checked 2 times against a primary source]
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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):
- FRE French (Français) (Pierre Mathé) , "Oh, n'aime pas trop longtemps", copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
Confirmed with W. B. Yeats, Later Poems, Macmillan and Co., London, 1926, page 86.
1 Wilkinson: "O do"2 Rorem: "he"
3 Wilkinson: "you'll"
Researcher for this text: John Versmoren