Song Cycle by John Ireland (1879-1962)

1. Summer schemes

Authorship

by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) , "Summer schemes", from Late Lyrics and Earlier with Many Other Verses, published 1922

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 When friendly summer calls again,
 	Calls again
 Her little fifers to these hills,
 We'll go - we two - to that arched fane
 Of leafage where they prime their bills
 Before they start to flood the plain
 With quavers,, minims, shakes, and trills.
 	'- We'll go', I sing; but who shall say
 	What may not chance before that day!

 And we shall see the waters spring,
 	Waters spring
 	From chinks the scrubby copses crown;
 And we shall trace their oncreeping
 To where the cascade tumbles down
 And sends the bobbing growths aswing,
 And ferns not quite but almost drown.
 	'- We shall', I say; but who may sing
 	Of what another moon will bring!

2. Her song

Authorship

by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) , "Her song", from Late Lyrics and Earlier with Many Other Verses, published 1922

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I sang that song on Sunday,
	To which an idle while,
I sang that song on Monday,
	As fittest to beguile:
I sang it as the year outwore,
	And the new slid in;
I thought not what might shape before
	Another would begin.

I sang that song in summer,
	All unforeknowingly,
To him as a new-comer
	From regions strange to me:
I sang it when in afteryears
	The shades stretched out,
And paths were faint; and flocking fears
	Brought cup-eyed care and doubt.

Sings he that song on Sundays
	In some dim land afar,
On Saturdays, or Mondays,
	As when the evening star
Glimpsed in upon his bending face,
	And my hanging hair,
And time untouched me with a trace
	Of soul-smart or despair?

3. Weathers

Authorship

by Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) , "Weathers"

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 This is the weather the cuckoo likes,
	And so do I;
 When showers betumble the chestnut spikes,
	And nestlings fly;
 And the little brown nightingale bills his best,
 And they sit outside at "The Traveller's Rest",
 And maids come forth sprig-muslin drest,
 And citizens dream of the south and west,
	And so do I.

 This is the weather the shepherd shuns,
	And so do I;
 When beeches drip in browns and duns,
	And thresh and ply;
 And hill-hid tides throb, throe on throe,
 And meadow rivulets overflow,
 And drops on gate bars hang in a row,
 And rooks in families homeward go,
	And so do I.

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