'Twas a year ago and the moon was bright (Oh, I remember so well, so well); I walked with my love in a sea of light, And the voice of my sweet was a silver bell. And sudden the moon grew strangely dull, And sudden my love had taken wing; I looked on the face of a grinning skull, I strained to my heart a ghastly thing. 'Twas but fantasy, for my love lay still In my arms, with her tender eyes aglow, And she wondered why my lips were chill, Why I was silent and kissed her so. A year has gone and the moon is bright, A gibbous moon, like a ghost of woe; I sit by a new-made grave to-night, And my heart is broken — it's strange, you know.
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Confirmed with The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses, New York, Barse & Hopkins, 1907, page 122.
Authorship:
- by Robert Service (1874 - 1958), "Premonition", appears in The Spell of the Yukon [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 Stephen Lias (b. 1966), "Premonition", 2007, copyright © 2007 [ baritone voice and piano ], from Songs of a Sourdough, no. 3 [sung text checked 1 time]
Researcher for this page: Andrew Schneider [Guest Editor]
This text was added to the website: 2019-11-10
Line count: 16
Word count: 133