Two Songs

Song Cycle by June Harple Collins (b. 1915?)

Word count: 91

?. Down by the Salley Gardens [sung text not yet checked]

Down by the Salley Gardens my love and I did meet;
She passed the Salley Gardens with little snow-white feet.
She bid me take [love]¹ easy, as the leaves grow on the [tree]²;
But I, being young and foolish, with her [did]³ not agree.

In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.

Authorship

by William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939), title 1: "An old song re-sung", title 2: "Down by the Salley Gardens", appears in The Wanderings of Oisin and Other Poems, first published 1889 [author's text checked 2 times against a primary source]

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

View original text (without footnotes)

Retitled "Down by the Salley Gardens" with the subtitle "An old song re-sung" when republished in Poems in 1895.

Note: "salley" is an anglicized form of the Irish word "saileach", which means willow.

¹ Gurney: "life"
² Edmunds: "trees"
³ Edmunds, Gurney: "would"

Researcher for this text: Ted Perry