Bedouin song | Bedouin love song | From the Desert I come to thee

From the Desert I come to thee

Language: English

From the Desert I come to thee
On a stallion shod with fire;
And the winds are left behind
In the speed of my desire.
Under thy window I stand,
And the midnight hears my cry:
I love thee, I love but thee,
With a love that shall not die
  Till the sun grows cold,
  And the stars are old,
  And the leaves of the Judgment Book Unfold!
 
Look from thy window and see
My passion and my pain;
I lie on the sands below,
And I faint in thy disdain.
Let the night-winds touch thy brow
With the heat of my burning sigh,
And melt thee to hear the vow
Of a love that shall not die
  Till the sun grows cold,
  And the stars are old,
  And the leaves of the Judgment Book Unfold!
 
My steps are nightly driven,
By the fever in my breast,
To hear from thy lattice breathed
The word that shall give me rest.
Open the door of thy heart,
And open thy chamber door,
And my kisses shall teach thy lips
The love that shall fade no more
  Till the sun grows cold,
  And the stars are old,
  And the leaves of the Judgment Book Unfold!

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Text Authorship:

by Bayard Taylor (1825 - 1878), "Bedouin song", from Poems of the Orient, first published 1854 [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 Charles R. Adams (1834 - 1900), "Bedouin song", published 1882 [ bass and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Avonia Bonney , "From the desert I come to thee", published 1885 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Dudley Buck (1839 - 1909), "Bedouin love song", op. 87 no. 2, published 1872 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by George Whitefield Chadwick (1854 - 1931), "Bedouin love song", 1890, published 1890 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Charles Whitney Coombs (1859 - 1940), "Bedouin love song", op. 2 (Two songs) no. ?, published 1883 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by M. S. Downs , "From the desert I come", published 1868 [ voice and piano ], also set in Italian [sung text not yet checked]
by Arthur Foote (1853 - 1937), "Bedouin song", published 1892 [ four-part men's chorus ], also set in German (1903) for four-part mixed chorus [sung text not yet checked]
by A. Haller Gross , "From the desert I come to thee", published 1888 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Charles Beach Hawley (1858 - 1915), "Bedouin love song", published 1897 [ low voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by George W. Marston (1840 - 1901), "Bedouin love song", published 1891 [ tenor or baritone and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Constance Morse , "Bedouin love song", published 1905 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by William Harold Neidlinger (1863 - 1924), "From the desert I come", published 1893 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Alfred Humphries Pease (1838 - 1882), "Bedouin song", published 1872 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by William H. Pilcher , "Bedouin love song", op. 34 no. 1, published 1893 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Ciro Ercole Pinsuti, Il Cavaliere (1829 - 1888), "Bedouin love song", published 1904 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Daniel Protheroe (1866 - 1934), "From the desert", op. 55 no. 4, published 1903 [ TTBB chorus a cappella ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Constantin Ivanovich Sternberg (1852 - 1924), "Song of the Arab", op. 81, published 1900 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website: 2008-07-06
Line count: 33
Word count: 203