"What shall I bring you? Please will white do Best for your wearing The long day through?" " - White is for weddings, Weddings, weddings, White is for weddings, And that won't do. - " "What shall I bring you? Please will red do Best for your wearing The long day through?" " - Red is for soldiers, Soldiers, soldiers, Red is for soldiers And that won't do. - " "What shall I bring you? Please will blue do Best for your wearing The long day through?" " - Blue is for sailors, Sailors, sailors, Blue is for sailors, And that won't do. - " "What shall I bring you? Please will green do Best for your wearing The long day through?" " - Green is for mayings, Mayings, mayings, Green is for mayings, And that won't do. - " "What shall I bring you Then? Will black do Best for your wearing The long day through?" " - Black is for mourning, Mourning, mourning, Black is for mourning, And black will do. - "
Four Hardy Songs
Song Cycle by Robin Humphrey Milford (1903 - 1959)
?. The colour  [sung text checked 1 time]
Authorship:
- by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928), "The colour", appears in Late Lyrics and Earlier with Many Other Verses, first published 1922 [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]
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Note with poem: "partly original, partly remembered"Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
?. To sincerity  [sung text not yet checked]
O sweet sincerity! - Where modern methods be What scope for thine and thee? Life may be sad past saying, Its greens for ever graying, Its faiths to dust decaying; And youth may have foreknown it, And riper seasons shown it, But custom cries: "Disown it: "Say ye rejoice, though grieving, Believe, while unbelieving, Behold, without perceiving!" - Yet, would men look at true things, And unilluded view things, And count to bear undue things, The real might mend the seeming, Facts better their foredeeming, And Life its disesteeming.
Authorship:
- by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928), "To sincerity", written 1899, appears in Time's Laughingstocks and Other Verses, first published 1909 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
?. If it's ever spring again  [sung text not yet checked]
If it's ever spring again, Spring again, I shall go where went I when Down the moor-cock splashed, and hen, Seeing me not, amid their flounder, Standing with my arm around her; If it's ever spring again, Spring again, I shall go where went I then. If it's ever summer-time, Summer-time, With the hay crop at the prime, And the cuckoos - two - in rhyme, As they used to be, or seemed to, We shall do as long we've dreamed to, If it's ever summer-time, Summer-time, With the hay, and bees achime.
Authorship:
- by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928), appears in Late Lyrics and Earlier with Many Other Verses, first published 1922 [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]
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Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]?. Tolerance  [sung text not yet checked]
"It is a foolish thing," said I, "To bear with such, and pass it by; Yet so I do, I know not why!" And at each clash I would surmise That if I had acted otherwise I might have saved me many sighs. But now the only happiness In looking back that I possess - Whose lack would leave me comfortless - Is to remember I refrained From masteries I might have gained, And for my tolerance was disdained; For see, a tomb. And if it were I had bent and broke, I should not dare To linger in the shadows there."
Authorship:
- by Thomas Hardy (1840 - 1928), "Tolerance", appears in Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries with Miscellaneous Pieces, first published 1914 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
Total word count: 460