One foot in Eden still, I stand And look across the other land. The world's great day is growing late, Yet strange these fields that we have planted So long with crops of love and hate. Time's handiworks by time are haunted, And nothing now can separate The corn and tares compactly grown. The armorial weed in stillness bound About the stalk; these are our own. Evil and good stand thick around In the fields of charity and sin Where we shall lead our harvest in. Yet still from Eden springs the root As clean as on the starting day. Time takes the foliage and the fruit And burns the archetypal leaf To shapes of terror and of grief Scattered along the winter way. But famished field and blackened tree Bear flowers in Eden never known. Blossoms of grief and charity Bloom in these darkened fields alone. What had Eden ever to say Of hope and faith and pity and love Until was buried all its day And memory found its treasure trove? Strange blessings never in Paradise Fall from these beclouded skies.
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First published in Listener, May 1950, revised 1956; confirmed with One Foot in Eden, London, Faber and Faber, 1956.
Text Authorship:
- by Edwin Muir (1887 - 1959), "One foot in Eden", appears in One Foot in Eden [author's text checked 1 time 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 Gordon Ware Binkerd (1916 - 2003), "One foot in Eden", published 1974 [ low voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
- by Stephen Wilkinson (b. 1919), "One foot in Eden" [ voice and piano ] [sung text checked 1 time]
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
This text was added to the website: 2022-02-09
Line count: 29
Word count: 183