When I would muse in boyhood

When I would muse in boyhood
  The wild green woods among,
And nurse resolves and fancies
  Because the world was young,
It was not foes to conquer,
  Nor sweethearts to be kind,
But it was friends to die for
  That I would seek and find.

I sought them far and found them,
  The sure, the straight, the brave,
The hearts I lost my own to,
  The souls I could not save.
They braced their belts about them,
  They crossed in ships the sea,
They sought and found six feet of ground,
  And there they died for me.

by Alfred Edward Housman (1859-1936) , no title, from Last Poems, no. 32, published 1922

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

by John Ireland (1879-1962) , "In boyhood", published 1928 [voice and piano], from We'll to the woods no more, no. 2.
by Leslie Russell , "When I would muse in boyhood", 1973 [soprano or tenor and piano], from The Ludlow Cycle, no. ?

Added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.

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