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Space to be Lonely

Song Cycle by Rachel Devore Fogarty

1. Extinguish My Eyes  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
Extinguish my eyes I still can see you:
Close my ears I can hear your footsteps fall:
And without feet I still can follow you:
Voiceless I can still return your call.
Break off my arms, and I can embrace you:
Enfold you with my heart as with a hand:
Hold my heart, my brain will take fire of you
As flax takes fire from a brand!
And flame will sweep in a flood:
Through all the singing currents of my blood:  Mmmmmmm....

Text Authorship:

  • by Jessie Lemont (1872 - 1947)

Based on:

  • a text in German (Deutsch) by Rainer Maria Rilke (1875 - 1926), "Lösch mir die Augen aus", appears in Das Stundenbuch, in 2. Das Buch von der Pilgerschaft, no. 7
    • Go to the text page.

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Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

2. Home Again  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
Where I used to be
I could hear the sea.
The black ragged palm fronds flung themselves against
       the twilight sky.
The moon stared up from the water like a fish's eye.
I had the loneliness that sings.
It made me light and gave me wings.

Is it the dust and the iron railings and the blank red brick
That makes me sick?
There is no space to be lonely any more
And crumbling feet on a city street
Sound past the door.

Text Authorship:

  • by Evelyn Scott (1893 - 1963), "Home Again", appears in Precipitations, copyright status unknown

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Confirmed with Evelyn Scott, Precipitations, 1920


Researcher for this page: Joost van der Linden [Guest Editor]

3. Evening
 (Sung text)

Language: English 
The sky in the west slowly puts on a fresh array of colors
Which are held for him by a row of ancient trees;
You watch: and the two worlds steal away from you;
One passes to heaven, the other falling;
Leaving you not really belonging to either,
Not so hushed and empty as a darkened house;
Not obsessed with the eternal like the stars which climb-
Leaving you (beyond words and unable to unwind) your life,
Shaken and awed by its vastness, unraveling
So that, now limited, but once more grasping,
Your life moves between both stone and star.

Text Authorship:

  • by Anonymous / Unidentified Author

Based on:

  • a text in German (Deutsch) by Rainer Maria Rilke (1875 - 1926), "Abend", appears in Das Buch der Bilder
    • Go to the text page.

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based on a literal translation of Sam Van Gool
Researcher for this page: Joost van der Linden [Guest Editor]

4. Loss

Language: English 
We walked this field together
 . . . . . . . . . .

— The rest of this text is not
currently in the database but will be
added as soon as we obtain it. —

Text Authorship:

  • by Anonymous / Unidentified Author

Go to the general single-text view

Total word count: 266
Gentle Reminder

This website began in 1995 as a personal project by Emily Ezust, who has been working on it full-time without a salary since 2008. Our research has never had any government or institutional funding, so if you found the information here useful, please consider making a donation. Your help is greatly appreciated!
–Emily Ezust, Founder

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