I'm happiest when most away
I can bear my soul from its home of clay
On a windy night when the moon is bright
And the eye can wander thru worlds of light

When I am not and none beside
Nor earth nor sea nor cloudless sky
But only spirit wandering wide
Thru infinite immensity.

About the headline (FAQ)

Note: in the Fisk work, this is sung by Edgar

Text Authorship:

• by Emily Brontë (1818 - 1848), no title, appears in The Complete Poems of Emily Brontë, first published 1910 [author's text not yet checked against a primary source]

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):

• by John Woods Duke (1899 - 1984), "Worlds of Light", 1970, published 1977 [ medium voice and piano ], from Six Songs on Poems by Emily Brontë, no. 3, Southern/NY [sung text not yet checked]
• by Terry Fisk , no title, published 2002 [ voice, piano ], from Wuthering Heights, no. 33 [sung text checked 1 time]
• by Pamela Harrison (1915 - 1990), "I'm happiest now when most away", 1954 [ soprano or tenor and piano ], from The Lonely Landscape [sung text not yet checked]
• by John Mitchell (b. 1941), "I'm happiest when most away", op. 24 no. 7 (1977), from The Earth, the Wind, and the Sky, no. 7 [sung text checked 1 time]

Researcher for this page: Victoria Brago

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 8
Word count: 55