Look not in my eyes | Look not in my eyes, for fear

by Alfred Edward Housman (1859 - 1936)

Look not in my eyes, for fear

Language: English

Our translations: FRE HEB

Look not in my eyes, for fear
  They mirror true the sight I see,
And there you find your face too clear
  And love it and be lost like me.
One the long nights through must lie
  Spent in star-defeated sighs,
But why should you as well as I
  Perish? Gaze not in my eyes.

A Grecian lad, as I hear tell,
  One that many loved in vain,
Looked into a forest well
  And never looked away again.
There, when the turf in springtime flowers,
  With downward eye and gazes sad,
Stands amid the glancing showers
  A jonquil, not a Grecian lad.

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Text Authorship:

by Alfred Edward Housman (1859 - 1936), no title, appears in A Shropshire Lad, no. 15, first published 1896 [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 Lennox Randal Francis Berkeley, Sir (1903 - 1989), "Look not in my eyes", op. 14 no. 3d (1940), published 1983 [ high voice and piano ], from Five Housman Songs, op. 14 no. 3, no. 4 [sung text checked 1 time]
by David Branson (b. 1909), "Look not in my eyes", published 1939 [ mezzo-soprano or baritone and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by George Sainton Kaye Butterworth (1885 - 1916), "Look not in my eyes", published 1911 [ voice and piano ], from Six Songs from A Shropshire Lad, no. 3 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Alfred Redgrave Cripps (1882 - 1950), "Look not in my eyes, for fear", published <<1944 [ voice and piano ], from Five "Shropshire Lad" Songs [sung text not yet checked]
by Blair Fairchild (1877 - 1933), "Look not in my eyes", op. 9 no. 1 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Thaddeus Gorecki , "Look not in my eyes, for fear", c1933 [sung text not yet checked]
by Timothy Hoekman , "Look not in my eyes", 1981, published 1988 [ voice and piano ], from Seven Housman Songs, no. 6, Look not in my eyes [sung text not yet checked]
by John (Nicholson) Ireland (1879 - 1962), "Ladslove", published 1921 [ voice and piano ], from The Land of Lost Content, no. 2 [sung text checked 1 time]
by John Theodore Livingston Raynor (1909 - 1970), "Look not in my eyes", op. 130 (1947) [ baritone and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by John Theodore Livingston Raynor (1909 - 1970), "Look Not In My Eyes", op. 520 (1958) [sung text not yet checked]
by John Theodore Livingston Raynor (1909 - 1970), "Look Not In My Eyes", op. 659 (1965) [sung text not yet checked]
by Corbett C. Sumsion , "Look not in my eyes", published c1936 [ TTBB chorus a cappella ] [sung text not yet checked]
by John Ramsden Williamson (1929 - 2015), "Look not in my eyes" [ baritone and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

Available translations, adaptations or excerpts, and transliterations (if applicable):

Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 16
Word count: 102