A song of enchantment (Mare, set by B. Britten, I. Boyle, V. Galway) (The Lied and Art Song Texts Page: Texts and Translations to Lieder, mélodies, canzoni, and other classical vocal music)


A song of enchantment I sang me there,
In a green-green wood, by waters fair,
Just as the words came up to me
I sang it under the wild wood tree. 

Widdershins turned I,singing it low,
Watching the wild birds come and go;
No cloud in the deep dark blue to be seen
Under the thick-thatched branches green. 

Twilight came; silence came;
The planet of evening's silver flame;
By darkening paths I wandered through
Thickets trembling with drops of dew. 

But the music is lost and the words are gone
Of the song I sang as I sat alone,
Ages and ages have fallen on me -
On the wood and the pool and the elder tree.

Authorship

Walter de la Mare (1873-1956)

Peacock Pie: A Book of Rhymes

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive)

Ina Boyle (1889-1967)

(Edward) Benjamin Britten (1913-1976)

Tit for tat

Victor Edward Galway

Added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.

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