Four songs for women's voices

Song Cycle by Eugene John Weigel (1910 - 1998)

?. A cradle song  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
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

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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

View original text (without footnotes)
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 page: Ted Perry , Malcolm Wren [Guest Editor]

?. A drinking song  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
Wine comes in at the mouth
And love comes in at the eye;
That's all we shall know for truth
Before we grow old and die.
I lift the glass to my mouth,
I look at you, and I sigh.

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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
  • IRI Irish (Gaelic) [singable] (Gabriel Rosenstock) , copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

?. To an Isle in the Water  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
Shy one, shy one, 
  Shy one of my heart,
She moves in the firelight
  Pensively apart.

She carries in the dishes,
  And lays them in a row.
To an isle in the water
  With her would I go.

She carries in the candles,
  And lights the curtained room,
Shy in the doorway
  And shy in the gloom;

And shy as a rabbit,
  Helpful and shy. 
To an isle in the water,
  With her [would I]1 fly.

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • FRE French (Français) (Guy Laffaille) , "Vers une île au milieu de l'eau", copyright © 2011, (re)printed on this website with kind permission
  • IRI Irish (Gaelic) [singable] (Gabriel Rosenstock) , copyright © 2016, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

View original text (without footnotes)
Confirmed with Yeats, William Butler. The Wanderings of Oisin: Dramatic Sketches, Ballads & Lyrics, T. Fisher Unwin, London, 1892, page 135.

1 Clarke: "I would"

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

?. To a squirrel at Kyle‑na‑no  [sung text not yet checked]

Language: English 
Come play with me;
Why should you run
Through the shaking tree
As though I'd a gun
To strike you dead?
When all I would do
Is to scratch your head
And let you go.

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Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

  • FRE French (Français) (Pierre Mathé) , "À un écureuil à Kyle-na-no", copyright © 2015, (re)printed on this website with kind permission

Confirmed with W. B. Yeats, Later Poems, Macmillan and Co., London, 1926, page 286.

First published in New Statesman, September 1917

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
Total word count: 203