The half-moon westers low | The half-moon westers low, my love

by Alfred Edward Housman (1859 - 1936)

The half‑moon westers low, my love

Language: English

The half-moon westers low, my love,
And the wind brings up the rain;
And wide apart we lie, my love,
And seas between the twain.

I know not if it rains, my love,
In the land where you do lie;
And oh, so sound you sleep, my love.
You know no more than I.

About the headline (FAQ)

Text Authorship:

by Alfred Edward Housman (1859 - 1936), no title, appears in Last Poems, no. 26, first published 1922 [author's text checked 2 times 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), "The half-moon westers low", op. 14 no. 3a (1940), published 1983 [ high voice and piano ], from Five Housman Songs, op. 14 no. 3, no. 1 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Benjamin Burrows (1891 - 1966), "The half-moon westers low", 1927 [ voice and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Susan Calvin , "The half-moon westers low", published 1965 [ SATB chorus a cappella ] [sung text not yet checked]
by John Woods Duke (1899 - 1984), "The half-moon westers low", 1957 [ baritone and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]
by Jake Heggie (b. 1961), "The half-moon westers low", 2005, first performed 2005 [ tenor and baritone with violin, viola, cello and piano ], from Here and Gone, no. 7 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Donald James Martino (1931 - 2005), "The half-moon westers low, my love", 1951, published 1978, from Separate Songs, no. 2 [sung text not yet checked]
by John Theodore Livingston Raynor (1909 - 1970), "The Half Moon Westers Low", op. 586 (1961) [sung text not yet checked]
by Leslie Russell , "The half-moon westers low, my love", 1973 [ soprano or tenor and piano ], from The Ludlow Cycle [sung text not yet checked]
by Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872 - 1958), "The half-moon westers low", 1927, published 1954, rev. 1954 [ voice and violin ], from Along the Field, no. 3 [sung text checked 1 time]
by Raymond Wilding-White (1922 - 2001), "The half-moon westers low", published 1969 [ high voice and piano ], from Three Housman Poems [sung text not yet checked]
by John Ramsden Williamson (1929 - 2015), "The half-moon westers low, my love " [ baritone and piano ] [sung text not yet checked]

Researcher for this page: Ted Perry

This text was added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.
Line count: 8
Word count: 54