The words are most important and evoke the melody. Together they fly.
Click on the title to read the words as the song plays - it opens in a new page.

Great Poems in Song

To try and speed up my music making process and getting more things to completion, I made this track on a one hour timer. Hope you enjoy!

Pond on the Hilltop

A cover of this great song, played by Cavendish - Peter Rechsteiner and Rob Noordeloos.

James Taylor - You've Got A Friend

We lived north of the future, days opened
letters with a child’s signature, a raspberry, a page of sky. 

My grandmother threw tomatoes
from her balcony, she pulled imagination like a blanket            
over my head. I painted
my mother’s face. She understood
loneliness, hid the dead in the earth like partisans.
 
The night undressed us (I counted
its pulse) my mother danced, she filled the past
with peaches, casseroles. At this, my doctor laughed,
    his granddaughter
touched my eyelid – I kissed  
                                                            
the back of her knee. The city trembled,
a ghost-ship setting sail.
And my classmate invented twenty names for Jew.
He was an angel, he had no name,
we wrestled, yes. My grandfathers fought

the German tanks on tractors, I kept a suitcase full
of Brodsky’s poems. The city trembled,
a ghost-ship setting sail. 
At night, I woke to whisper: yes, we lived. 
We lived, yes, don’t say it was a dream. 

At the local factory, my father
took a handful of snow, put it in my mouth.
The sun began a routine narration,
whitening their bodies: mother, father dancing, moving
as the darkness spoke behind them.
It was April. The sun washed the balconies, April. 

I retell the story the light etches
into my hand: Little book, go to the city without me.
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My melody to Kaminsky's words: 2-3
https://www.ilyakaminsky.com
Pic by Henn Kim
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This sung-poem had an unusual start, perhaps synchronistic, wu wei, ‘in tune’. 

I wandered into the book shop with no clear aim, except to stop by the poetry corner. Felt tired. One book, longer than the others, its black spine standing out, insisted on being read. I objected to wasting time and energy; it wasn't for me, but it insisted: ‘Starry Night, Blurry Dreams’ by HENN KIM (in capitals). As I opened it, a new song started over the shop speakers: ‘Starry Starry Night’. I was…gobsmacked. What could it mean? A line of poetry on one page accompanied a drawing on the other. Good - but still, not for me. I looked either side of the book. One had Milk and Honey by poet Rupi Kaur I'd been recommended just a few days before. The other had a slim book I didn't know: Dancing in Odessa. It might work with song. I had to do something with this synch. 

On the way to the cashier, another song began over the shop speakers: Do you want to know a secret? Of course I do. An early Beatles song, but with an ethereal quality moving it to another zone. The cashier shazammed and said it was Fairground Attraction. Following her brought me to the music section, where three books called and were answered.

With all this magic in the air, I looked forward to the poems. Oh but where was there anything to put into song? The critics all raved about its musicality, but I saw only musical phrases, not verses. So I just spoke a poem in the train. Then as certain rhythms of words and phrases arose so did the idea of song without verses. It was evening; the platform was empty, and I recorded.

Dancing In Odessa - Ilya Kaminsky (in song)

Bring me all of your dreams,  
You dreamers. 
 Bring me all of your 
 Heart melodies 
That I may wrap them 
 In a blue cloud-cloth 
Away from the too rough fingers 
Of the world. 

------------
My melody to Hughes' words
p64 8-14sc
From The Weary Blues (Alfred A. Knopf, 1926) by Langston Hughes.
Dreams - https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/dreams-langston-hughes-in-song?si=761e8412f6864530aa6f67783c5242e8&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing 
------------
Langston often takes the part of another in his poems, and I am wondering who The Dream Keeper is here. In his poem ‘Dreams’, he says ‘Hold fast to your dreams’, while here he says give them to the dream keeper to stay safe from the too rough fingers of the world. The first says stay true to your dreams despite all the knocks you suffer, while this seems to say give me your dreams to avoid the hard knocks. 

Did he change his mind? Is he testing two viewpoints? Or is there some place where the opposites meet? If the Dream Keeper is God or the Poet, the message might be - put your dreams into their safekeeping, so they remain untarnished, unbroken and potent while you fight for them, like, perhaps, the flag that flies high while the battle rages all around it. 

What would this mean in practice? I suppose do not let setbacks destroy your dream. 'Dream' links to 'Heart melodies' - so perhaps connected with love.  If the dream is valid, its day may yet come. In this respect, it relates to Whittier’s Don’t Quit.

The Dream Keeper - Langston Hughes (in song)

Angelia D. Angel - Millions Of Years Still Love You

Novo Começo

Be Free

Warm - (Piano Only Instrumental)

John Milton - On His Blindness - Poem

1 Treaty 
2 Going Home 
3 Famous Blue Raincoat 
4 Dance Me to the End of Love (Live) 
5 If I Didn't Have Your Love 
6 Never Any Good 
7 You Want It Darker 
8 It Seemed the Better Way 
9 On That Day 
10 Everybody Knows 
11 Suzanne 
12 Darkness 
13 Tower of Song 
14 Closing Time 
15 Anthem 
16 So Long, Marianne 
17 If It Be Your Will 
18 Steer Your Way 
19 Hallelujah 
20 In My Secret Life 
21 Lullaby 
22 Leaving the Table 
23 The Future 
24 I'm Your Man 
25 Hey, That's No Way to Say Goodbye 
26 Take This Waltz

Leonard Cohen

Poem by Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

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My melody to the poem by Dylan Thomas
This is the first recording on the day it was written in the park.
This later with simple piano:
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/do-not-go-gentle-into-that-goodnight-dylan-thomas-in-song

Do not go gentle into that good night --- Dylan Thomas (in song)

This poem is for my brother Bruce 
(Charles Wolfe addressed his poem 'To Mary')

IF I had thought thou couldst have died,
        I might not weep for thee;
But I forgot, when by thy side,
        That thou couldst mortal be:
It never through my mind had past
        The time would e'er be o'er,
And I on thee should look my last,
        And thou shouldst smile no more!

And still upon that face I look,
        And think 'twill smile again;
And still the thought I will not brook,
        That I must look in vain.
But when I speak—thou dost not say
        What thou ne'er left'st unsaid;
And now I feel, as well I may,
        Sweet Mary, thou art dead!

If thou wouldst stay, e'en as thou art,
        All cold and all serene—
I still might press thy silent heart,
        And where thy smiles have been.
While e'en thy chill, bleak corse I have,
        Thou seemest still mine own;
But there—I lay thee in thy grave,
        And I am now alone!

I do not think, where'er thou art,
        Thou hast forgotten me;
And I, perhaps, may soothe this heart
        In thinking too of thee:
Yet there was round thee such a dawn
        Of light ne'er seen before,
As fancy never could have drawn,
        And never can restore!
------------------------

30/7/18
"In the night I was making a prayer to my guardian angel, when I felt the arrival of another spirit. I felt immediately it was Bruce, but wondered if it was polite to interrupt my prayer to welcome him. Immediately the answer came back, of course, and I thought perhaps the angel had facilitated it. Bruce gave me a hug. It felt somehow as though our two spirits were merging for a moment. It was comforting and tearful. Afterwards I said thanks to both. and quickly fell asleep."

18/4/20
"I was tired going to bed. A minute or two after closing my eyes, Bruce appeared before me. His face filled the screen of my vision and, perhaps, also or later, the top of his body. I can’t describe the look on his face. It was one I recognised and something more. He was simply present, no talking, smiling, or facial gestures of any kind. And immediately I felt my heart relaxing and that fragile feeling I’d had all day disappeared in a moment. I couldn’t keep the vision for long - I don’t know: 5 seconds, 10, I doubt 15. It made me happy."

To Bruce --- Charles Wolfe (To Mary)

This lunar beauty
Has no history
Is complete and early,
If beauty later
Bear any feature
It had a lover
And is another.

This like a dream
Keeps other time
And daytime is
The loss of this,
For time is inches
And the heart's changes
Where ghost has haunted
Lost and wanted.

But this was never
A ghost's endeavour
Nor finished this,
Was ghost at ease,
And till it pass
Love shall not near
The sweetness here
Nor sorrow take
His endless look.

--------------
My melody to a poem by WH Auden
(the first fine careless rapture)
wed2ndinchesbsc

This Lunar Beauty --- WH Auden (in song)

Love, meet me in the green glen, 
Beside the tall elm-tree, 
Where the sweetbriar smells so sweet agen; 
There come with me. 
Meet me in the green glen.

Meet me at the sunset 
Down in the green glen, 
Where we’ve often met 
By hawthorn-tree and foxes’ den, 
Meet me in the green glen.

Meet me in the green glen, 
By sweetbriar bushes there; 
Meet me by your own sen, 
Where the wild thyme blossoms fair. 
Meet me in the green glen.

Meet me by the sweetbriar, 
By the mole-hill swelling there; 
When the west glows like a fire 
God’s crimson bed is there. 
Meet me in the green glen.

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My first melody for John Clare's poem
6May10 1stv 2ndedsc

Love meet me in the Green Glen _ v1 --- John Clare

Ca' the yowes to the knowes, 
Ca' them where the heather grows, 
Ca' them where the burnie rowes, 
My bonie Dearie. 

Hark the mavis' e'ening sang, 
Sounding Clouden's woods amang; 
Then a-faulding let us gang, 
My bonie Dearie. 

We'll gae down by Clouden side, 
Thro' the hazels, spreading wide, 
O'er the waves that sweetly glide, 
To the moon sae clearly. 

Yonder Clouden's silent towers,
Where, at moonshine's midnight hours, 
O'er the dewy-bending flowers, 
Fairies dance sae cheery. 

Ghaist nor bogle shalt thou fear, 
Thou'rt to Love and Heav'n sae dear, 
Nocht of ill may come thee near; 
My bonie Dearie. 

Fair and lovely as thou art, 
Thou hast stown my very heart; 
I can die - but canna part, 
My bonie Dearie. 

Ca'the yowes to the knowes, 
Ca' them where the heather grows, 
Ca' them where the burnie rowes, 
My bonie Dearie.

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My melody to a poem by Robert Burns
With thanks to two Mavis's who helped me recently.
And apologies for pronunciation :)

'Yowes' means ewes and 'knowes' knolls or hills - Thus 'Drive (or 'Call') the ewes to the hills' 
harkthurarch 2nd

Ca' the Yowes to the Knowes --- Robert Burns (new melody)

I caught this morning morning's minion, king-
dom of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird, – the achieve of, the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.

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My melody to Hopkins' poem - with bird chorus
Sep 10 Thur 3rd
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Link to a third version:
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/the-windhover-gm-hopkins-in-song?si=2f12c5105b0e45589f73cf610ad9502c&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

The Windhover --- Gerard Manley Hopkins (in song, with bird chorus)

For the best experience, 
-  Click on the song's picture for words and notes.
-  in Album/Playlist/Spotlight, first click on the big picture to the left, then on the new page click the track title. Really, it's worth the effort :) 

With Blake you will see his painting too. Each picture is in dialogue with the words (not just illustrating them).

Bards have combined music & poetry from earliest times. Many poets continue the connection, not least William Blake. But often their melodies are lost or neglected.

Ca' the Yowes to the Knowes --- Robert Burns (new melody)

Ian

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