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

Poem by John Clare

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. 
-----------------------

My second melody for John Clare's poem
See v3 for both together
(GG3 May10 2020 v2)

Love meet me in the Green Glen _ v2 --- John Clare

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.

----------
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)

Oh, to be in England
Now that April's there,
And whoever wakes in England
Sees, some morning, unaware,
That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England - now!!

And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops - at the bent spray's edge -
That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children's dower
- Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

---------------------
My melody to poem by Robert Browning
thurarch3rd - Sep24
-----------
Here is another version, similar with a different feel:
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/home-thoughts-from-abroad-2-robert-browning-in-song

And other poems-in-song here with Browning
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/the-pied-piper-of-hamelin_rats-robert-browning-in-song 
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/cavalier-songs-robert-browning-in-song

Home Thoughts From Abroad

Home Thoughts From Abroad  --- Robert Browning (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.

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

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

So, we'll go no more a roving 
   So late into the night, 
Though the heart be still as loving, 
   And the moon be still as bright. 

For the sword outwears its sheath, 
   And the soul wears out the breast, 
And the heart must pause to breathe, 
   And love itself have rest. 

Though the night was made for loving, 
   And the day returns too soon, 
Yet we'll go no more a roving 
   By the light of the moon.

------------
My melody to a poem by Lord Byron, written at 29, seven years before his death in Greece at 36.
Aug14Stux2edsc
[Thurarchoct2nd
Aug22 3rdbsc - first]

So We'll Go No More A Roving --- Byron (in song)

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.

------------
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)

Oh, to be in England
Now that April's there,
And whoever wakes in England
Sees, some morning, unaware,
That the lowest boughs and the brushwood sheaf
Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,
While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough
In England - now!!

And after April, when May follows,
And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dewdrops - at the bent spray's edge -
That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!
And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
All will be gay when noontide wakes anew
The buttercups, the little children's dower
- Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

---------------------
My melody to poem by Robert Browning
with syncopated rhythm
archoct8
[Thurarchoctx1]
----------------------
Other poems here (in song) with Robert Browning
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/the-pied-piper-of-hamelin_rats-robert-browning-in-song 
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/cavalier-songs-robert-browning-in-song

Home Thoughts From Abroad v2 --- Robert Browning (in song)

Silent fell the rain on the earthly ground;
Then arose around to complain:
Why am I cast down from the cloud so sweet,
Trampled by the feet of the clown?

Why was I drawn though all the rainbow bright
Who her smile did delight me to woo?
Why am I cast down from the cloud so sweet
Trampled by the feet of the clown?

Then my tremblings ceased; 
To the smile I bowed
And the weeping cloud me released.

Then the cruel smile
Flashed like agony
And I fall and die through a wile.

Why am I cast down 
From the cloud so sweet
Trampled by the feet 
Of the clown?

------
My melody to a poem by Richard Dixon

Dixon was a close friend of Gerard Manley Hopkins, and Hopkins wrote a tune for this poem - which still exists, though I haven't heard it.

Both men suffered from depressions at periods. This poem, which I first thought to be just a grumble, may be more. 

The poem is called 'Fallen Rain'. The Canon seems to suggest that the delightful and cruel smile come from the same source, presumably God. And there is trickery involved, perhaps connected with the birth and expulsion from Eden. For who would willingly accept life's sufferings? So, he asks... Why?

Thurarch1st

Silent Fell The Rain --- RW Dixon (poem in song)

When my love swears that she is made of truth, 
I do believe her, though I know she lies, 
That she might think me some untutored youth, 
Unlearnèd in the world’s false subtleties. 
Thus vainly thinking that she thinks me young, 
Although she knows my days are past the best, 
Simply I credit her false-speaking tongue: 
On both sides thus is simple truth suppressed. 
But wherefore says she not she is unjust? 
And wherefore say not I that I am old? 
Oh, love’s best habit is in seeming trust, 
And age in love loves not to have years told. 
    Therefore I lie with her and she with me, 
    And in our faults by lies we flattered be.

-----------------
My melody to Shakespeare's sonnet
1 Nov x1
[fri2 5n6]

Sonnet 138: When my love swears... --- Shakespeare (in song)

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.

---------
My melody to Hopkins' poem - with bird chorus
Sep 10 Thur 3rd
------------
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)

-------------
 Rats! 
They fought the dogs, and killed the cats, 
   And bit the babies in the cradles, 
And eat the cheeses out of the vats, 
   And licked the soup from the cooks' own ladles, 
Split open the kegs of salted sprats, 
Made nests inside men's Sunday hats, 
And even spoiled the women's chats 
      By drowning their speaking 
      With shrieking and squeaking 
In fifty different sharps and flats.

-------------
My melody to a famous verse from Browning's poem
Rats Beck Th 10-14
Other poems  here (in song) with Robert Browning;
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/home-thoughts-from-abroad-2-robert-browning-in-song 
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/cavalier-songs-robert-browning-in-song 
------------------------
In 1284, while the town of Hamelin was suffering from a rat infestation, a piper dressed in multicolored ("pied") clothing appeared, claiming to be a rat-catcher. He promised the mayor a solution to their problem with the rats. The mayor, in turn, promised to pay him for the removal of the rats. The piper accepted and played his pipe to lure the rats into the Weser River, where they all drowned.

Despite the piper's success, the mayor reneged on his promise and refused to pay him the full sum, even going so far as to blame the piper for bringing the rats himself in an extortion attempt. Enraged, the piper stormed out of the town, vowing to return later to take revenge. 

On Saint John and Paul's day, while the adults were in church, the piper returned dressed in green like a hunter and playing his pipe. In so doing, he attracted the town's children. One hundred and thirty children followed him out of town and into a cave and were never seen again. 

Depending on the version, at most three children remained behind: one was lame and could not follow quickly enough, the second was deaf and could not hear the music, and the last was blind and unable to see where he was going. These three told the villagers what had happened when they came out from church.

Wikipedia

Rats! The Pied Piper of Hamelin --- Robert Browning (a verse in song)

All day and night, save winter, every weather,
Above the inn, the smithy, and the shop,
The aspens at the cross-roads talk together
Of rain, until their last leaves fall from the top.

Out of the blacksmith’s cavern comes the ringing
Of hammer, shoe, and anvil; out of the inn
The clink, the hum, the roar, the random singing —
The sounds that for these fifty years have been.

The whisper of the aspens is not drowned,
And over lightless pane and footless road,
Empty as sky, with every other sound
Not ceasing, calls their ghosts from their abode,

A silent smithy, a silent inn, nor fails
In the bare moonlight or the thick-furred gloom,
In tempest or the night of nightingales,
To turn the cross-roads to a ghostly room.

And it would be the same were no house near.
Over all sorts of weather, men, and times,
Aspens must shake their leaves and men may hear
But need not listen, more than to my rhymes.

Whatever wind blows while they and I have leaves
We cannot other than an aspen be
That ceaselessly, unreasonably grieves,
Or so men think who like a different tree.

------------
My melody to Edward Thomas' poem
Studio Oct25 1sted

Aspens --- Edward Thomas (in song)

"Ferry me across the water,
Do, boatman, do."
"If you've a penny in your purse
I'll ferry you."

"I have a penny in my purse,
And my eyes are blue;
So ferry me across the water,
Do, boatman, do!"

"Step into my ferry-boat,
Be they black or blue,
And for the penny in your purse
I'll ferry you."

-----------
My melody to Rossetti's poem
8aug
-----------
Another tune for the poem:
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/ferry-me-across-the-water-christina-rossetti-in-song-1 
And another poem by Rossetti with my melody:
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/who-has-seen-the-wind-christina-rossetti-in-song

---------------
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/christina-rossetti 
Rossetti’s childhood was exceptionally happy, characterized by affectionate parental care and the creative companionship of older siblings. In temperament she was most like her brother Dante Gabriel: their father called the pair the “two storms” of the family in comparison to the “two calms,” Maria and William. 

Christina was given to tantrums and fractious behavior, and she fought hard to subdue this passionate temper. Years later, counseling a niece subject to similar outbursts, the mature Christina looked back on the fire now stifled: “You must not imagine, my dear girl, that your Aunt was always the calm and sedate person you now behold. I, too, had a very passionate temper; but I learnt to control it. On one occasion, being rebuked by my dear Mother for some fault, I seized upon a pair of scissors, and ripped up my arm to vent my wrath. I have learnt since to control my feelings—and no doubt you will!”. 

Self-control was, indeed, achieved—perhaps too much so. In his posthumous memoir of his sister that prefaces The Poetical Works of Christina Georgina Rossetti (1904), William laments the thwarting of her high spirits: “In innate character she was vivacious, and open to pleasurable impressions; and, during her girlhood, one might readily have supposed that she would develop into a woman of expansive heart, fond of society and diversions, and taking a part in them of more than average brilliancy. What came to pass was of course quite the contrary.” As an adult Christina Rossetti was considered by many to be overscrupulous and excessively restrained...

Caught up in the Tractarian or Oxford Movement when it reached London in the 1840s, the Rossettis shifted from an Evangelical to an Anglo-Catholic orientation, and this outlook influenced virtually all of Christina Rossetti’s poetry. She was also influenced by the poetics of the Oxford Movement...

Looking back on her career, Rossetti wrote in an 1888 letter to an unknown clergyman that “Perhaps the nearest approach to a method I can lay claim to was a distinct aim at conciseness; after a while I received a hint from my sister that my love of conciseness tended to make my writing obscure, and I then endeavoured to avoid obscurity as well as diffuseness. In poetics, my elder brother was my acute and most helpful critic.”...

Though increasingly reclusive, however, Rossetti was more politically outspoken in these later years. Critical of slavery, imperialism, and military aggression, she was most passionately committed to the antivivisection movement... She also petitioned for legislation to protect children from prostitution and sexual exploitation by raising the age of consent.

-------------
Blake - Rossetti connection: Blake's notebook (originally his dear brother Robert's) was given by Blake's widow in 1827 to William Palmer, brother of Blake's pupil, the artist Samuel Palmer. William Palmer sold it to the artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti (Christina's brother) for ten shillings in 1847.

3 brothers - interesting.

Ferry Me Across the Water -- Christina Rossetti (in song)

My melody to a song by Charles Jeffries (words) and Sidney Nelson (music) c.1820. This and 'Ca' the Yowes to the Knowes' are a thank you to two friends called 'Mavis'. Their name means 'song bird' and appears in both poems/lyrics. 

'Mary of Argyll' is Mary Campbell, aka Highland Mary, and may have married Robert Burns just before her death.

The following is from Wikipedia and BBC:
Mary Campbell (christened Margaret, 1763–1786) was the daughter of Archibald Campbell of Daling, a sailor in a revenue cutter, and Agnes Campbell.

Mary was "tall, fair haired with blue eyes". She was also described as "a great favourite with everyone who knew her, due to her pleasant manners, sweet temper and obliging disposition. Her figure was graceful; the cast of her face was singularly delicate and of fair complexion, and her eyes were bluish and lustrous had a remarkably winning expression.”

She died at 23, probably from Typhus after nursing her brother Robert. She was buried in the old West Kirk churchyard at Greenock.

Robert Burns writes: “My Highland lassie was a warm-hearted, charming young creature as ever blessed a man with generous love. After a pretty long tract of the most ardent reciprocal attachment, we met by appointment, on the second Sunday of May, in a sequestered spot by the Banks of Ayr, where we spent the day in taking a farewel, before she should embark for the West-Highlands, to arrange matters among her friends for our projected change of life. At the close of Autumn following she crossed the sea to meet me at Greenock, where she had scarce landed when she was seized with a malignant fever, which hurried my dear girl to the grave in a few days, before I could even hear of her illness.”

Years after her death, Burns would think of her fondly and with great sadness. The heartfelt poem "To Mary in Heaven" was written at Ellisland Farm on the third anniversary of her death. Jean Armour recalled that towards evening, the night before, Robert grew sad, and wandered in solitary contemplation along the banks of the River Nith and about the farmyard in extreme agitation. Even though he was repeatedly asked to come into the house, he would not. Burns entered the house at daybreak, sat down and wrote his address to "Mary in Heaven”

'To Mary in Heaven': 
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p03xsn3r 

Thou lingering star, with lessening ray
That lovest to greet the early morn,
Again thou usherest in the day
My Mary from my Soul was torn.
O Mary! Dear, departed Shade!
Where is thy place of blissful rest?
Seest thou thy lover lowly laid?
Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast?...

Mary inspired some of Burns's finest and most famous poems.

'Highland Lassie O' - 1786
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p03z1kwm 

Nae gentle dames tho' ne'er sae fair
Shall ever be my Muse's care;
Their titles a' are empty show, 
Gie me my Highland Lassie, O...

She has my heart, she has my hand,
By secret Truth and Honor's band:
Till the mortal stroke shall lay me low,
I'm thine, my Highland Lassie, O....

'Will ye go to the Indies my Mary': https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p03zwkz4 

'My Highland Mary'  - 1792
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p03xpgnz 

Ye banks, and braes, and streams around 
The castle o' Montgomery! 
Green be your woods, and fair your flowers, 
Your waters never drumlie: 
There Simmer first unfauld her robes, 
And there the langest tarry; 
For there I took the last Farewell 
O' my sweet Highland Mary... 

O pale, pale now, those rosy lips, 
I aft hae kiss'd sae fondly! 
And clos'd for aye, the sparkling glance 
That dwalt on me sae kindly! 
And mouldering now in silent dust, 
That heart that lo'ed me dearly! 
But still within my bosom's core 
Shall live my Highland Mary.

[Studio 1abaug1]

Mary Of Argyll

"Ferry me across the water,
Do, boatman, do."
"If you've a penny in your purse
I'll ferry you."

"I have a penny in my purse,
And my eyes are blue;
So ferry me across the water,
Do, boatman, do!"

"Step into my ferry-boat,
Be they black or blue,
And for the penny in your purse
I'll ferry you."

-----------
The classical ferryman was Charon, who carried the newly-dead across the River Styx and into Hades. Here a woman flirts with the Ferryman - offering not only the fare but her love too. The Ferryman replies that he treats all alike so long as they pay the price.

If the woman wishes to die, the poem suggests this is beside the point - for there is a price to pay first. The reader may reflect on what that price might be for them. 
--------------
My melody to Rossetti's poem - c.1872
studio a4
----------------------
For another tune to the poem:
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/ferry-me-across-the-water-christina-rossetti-in-song 

And another poem by Rossetti with my melody:
https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/who-has-seen-the-wind-christina-rossetti-in-song
----------------
Wikipedia
In the 1840s, Christina's family faced severe financial difficulties due to the deterioration of her father's physical and mental health. In 1843, he was diagnosed with persistent bronchitis, possibly tuberculosis, and faced losing his sight. He gave up his teaching post at King's College and though he lived another 11 years, he suffered from depression and was never physically well again. Rossetti's mother began teaching to keep the family out of poverty

When she was 14 (1844), Rossetti suffered a nervous breakdown and left school. Bouts of depression and related illness followed… [Biographers cannot agree why: to avoid working as a governess, heart condition, mental illness, parental incest - Poetry Foundation]

In 1849 she became seriously ill again, suffering from depression and sometime around 1857 had a major religious crisis… 3 suitors were turned down for religious reasons…

Rossetti was a volunteer worker from 1859 to 1870 at the St Mary Magdalene house of charity in Highgate, a refuge for former prostitutes…

Rossetti began writing down and dating her poems from 1842… Her early pieces often feature meditations on death and loss, in the Romantic tradition…She published her first two poems ("Death's Chill Between", "Heart's Chill Between") in the Athenaeum in 1848, when she was 18…

Rossetti's most famous collection, Goblin Market and Other Poems, appeared in 1862, when she was 31. It received widespread critical praise, establishing her as the foremost female poet of the time. Hopkins, Swinburne and Tennyson lauded her, and with the death of Elizabeth Barrett Browning in 1861 she was hailed as her natural successor…

Rossetti maintained a large circle of friends and correspondents, and continued to write and publish for the rest of her life, focusing mainly on devotional writing and children's poetry...

In the later decades of her life, Rossetti suffered from Graves' disease, diagnosed in 1872, suffering a near-fatal attack in the early 1870s. In 1893, she developed breast cancer and though the tumour was removed, there was a recurrence in September 1894. She died in Bloomsbury on 29 Dec 1894 and was buried in Highgate Cemetery. The place where she died, in Torrington Square, is marked with a stone tablet.

In 2000… a poetry stone was placed in what used to be the grounds of North Hill House in Frome. On one side is an excerpt from her poem, "What Good Shall My Life Do Me": 

"Love lights the sun: love through the dark
Lights the moon's evanescent arc:
Same Love lights up the glow-worms spark.”

Ferry Me Across The Water v2 --- Christina Rossetti (in song)

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O’er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning;
By the struggling moonbeam’s misty light
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin enclosed his breast,
Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him,
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest
With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed
And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o’er his head,
And we far away on the billow!

Lightly they’ll talk of the spirit that’s gone
And o’er his cold ashes upbraid him,
But little he’ll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done
When the clock struck the hour for retiring;
And we heard the distant and random gun
That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
From the field of his fame fresh and gory;
We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone,
But left him alone with his glory.

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My melody to Wolfe's poem
studio 1 Nov 3rd

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+ later recording https://soundcloud.com/user-734457954/the-burial-of-sir-john-moore-at-corunna-charles-wolfe-in-song

The Burial of Sir John Moore --- Charles Wolfe (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 melody to Clare's poem
1n2 Arch 1n3ed2
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John Clare was born into a peasant family in the small English village of Helpston in 1793.. [Though] both of his parents were virtually illiterate, Clare did receive some formal schooling as a youth. He attended a day school for a few months every year until he was about twelve years old, and then he went to night school, studied informally with other boys in the area, and read in his spare time. Clare’s favourite books included Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe and Izaak Walton’s The Compleat Angler. 

He became an agricultural labourer while still a child… In his early adult years, Clare became a potboy in the Blue Bell public house and fell in love with Mary Joyce, his muse for many poems; but her father, a prosperous farmer, forbade her to meet him, and he later married Patty Turner. Subsequently, he was a gardener at Burghley House. He enlisted in the militia, tried camp life with Gypsies, and worked in Pickworth, Rutland as a lime burner in 1817. In the following year he was obliged to accept parish relief. Malnutrition stemming from childhood may have been the main factor behind his five-foot stature and have contributed to his poor physical health in later life.

Scholars now recognise Clare as an important poet and prose writer. “As an observer of what it was like in England in the early nineteenth century, not only for the peasant but also from a peasant point of view, he is irreplaceable,” declared Thornton...

In an attempt to hold off his parents' eviction from their home, Clare offered his poems to a local bookseller named Edward Drury, who sent them to his cousin…This book was highly praised, and the next year his Village Minstrel and Other Poems was published. "There was no limit to the applause bestowed upon Clare, unanimous in their admiration of a poetical genius coming before them in the humble garb of a farm labourer.”…

Clare was constantly torn between the two worlds of literary London and his often illiterate neighbours; between the need to write poetry and the need for money to feed and clothe his children. His health began to suffer, and he had bouts of severe depression, which became worse after his sixth child was born in 1830 and as his poetry sold less well.

Dr Matthew Allen wrote about Clare to The Times in 1840:
“It is most singular that ever since he came here [High Beech Asylum] the moment he gets pen or pencil in hand he begins to write most poetical effusions. Yet he has never been able to obtain in conversation, nor even in writing prose, the appearance of sanity for two minutes or two lines together, and yet there is no indication of insanity in any of his poetry.”

Between Christmas and New Year in 1841, Clare was committed to the Northampton General Lunatic Asylum..He remained there for the rest of his life under the humane regime of Dr Thomas Octavius Prichard, who encouraged and helped him to write…It was in this later poetry that Clare "developed a very distinctive voice, an unmistakable intensity and vibrance, such as the later pictures of Van Gogh" possessed.

[Thanks to Wikipedia and The Poetry Foundation]

Meet Me In The Green Glen v3 --- John Clare (in song)

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the caldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg and howlet's wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and caldron bubble.
Cool it with a baboon's blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.

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My melody to Shakespeare's words
 8edsc

Song Of The Witches --- Shakespeare  (in song)

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.

Great Poems in Song

Ian