Songs from the Uglee Meadow - LYRICS
Songs from the Uglee Meadow was my debut album. It is in nature an acoustic set of 10 tracks; the songs are all original apart from I Will Be A Stranger which was written by Dave Kent, who played guitar and keyboard. Wind instruments played by Will Summers, hurdy gurdy by Phil Martin and violin by Sarah Tadros. All other instrumentation and vocals by myself. Artwork for inner sleeve by Esther Winckles (nee Remmington)
KITTY'S ANGEL
I have loved thee with an everlasting love
And the night shall be filled with music
And the cares that infect the day
Shall fold their tents like the Arabs
And as silently steal away
I loved you so on earth
And surely God will love you more than I
No fear nor dread by yours tonight
My thoughts of you shall spring
like tender flowers about the path you tread
Sleep, love, it is not yet the dawn
Angels guard thee, sweet love, until morn
Beloved my heart is with you
As you stray wide-eyed among the angels
Dear Christ keep my little maid from sorrow
And when she wakes, may mother Mary watch beside her sleep
Sleep, love, it is not yet the dawn
Angels guard thee, sweet love, until morn
Sleep love, sleep love, angel
Sleep love, sleep love, until morn
LORDS AND LADIES
Come from the woods
Come from the stream
Come from the meadows, oh so green
Come from the hills
Come from the sea
All you lords and ladies dance with me
Whither the woods
Whither the stream
Whither the meadows, oh so green
Whither the hills
Whither the sea
All you lords and ladies dance with me
STILL
Like the thread of a restless dream that flickers into morning
Like the tail of a broken kite that dances o'er the hill
Like the path of the moon across the sea
Where angels leave their tail lights
Still, still, you are calling still
Like the lines on a missing page, a half forgotten childhood
Like a wishboat upon the stream that's floating out to sea
Like the mist of a silent dawn exploding into sunlight
Like a voice in the howling storm
That's on the edge of hearing
Like a stag sensed among the trees
You turn and then he's gone
Still, still, you are calling still,
To me, to me, and those who know how to listen
Who knows when the time comes,
Who knows where the time goes
UNDER THE GREENWOOD TREE
(passage from 'The Once and Future King' by T H White)
Under the greenwood tree
Who loves to lie with me
And tune his merry note
Unto to sweet bird's throat
Come hither, come hither, come hither
Here shall we see no enemy
But winter and rough weather
Who doth ambition shun
And loves to lie in sun
Seeking the food he eats
And pleased with what he gets
Where wood and waters meet
By the hoary willow's seat
My love behoves him sweet
With dancers at his feet
GREEN MAN AND THE WILLOW
I stepped out one morning to greet the new day
My feet were so restless, they took me away
My path led me onward to the sweet riverside
And there I saw green man beholding his bride
He said "Now, my fair one, your side I must leave,
But I would entreat you not a moment to grieve
For I must go rambling so far and so wide
And then I'll return to the sweet riverside"
She plucked off a branch and she handed it down
Then trembled so fiercely her leaves fell around
She said, "I'll give you my silver, I'll give you my gold
A staff for to lean on, and a cloak for the cold"
I stepped this morning the season to see
Saw leaf buds appearing on each waking tree
The river was laughing and calling to all
Here's willow and green man united once more.
LOVE IS A GARDEN
My love is a garden, growing
My friends are the wind in the trees, blowing
My hopes are the seeds in the breeze a-shaking
With a dream of a fuller garden making
I tend to the flowers, subliming
And so to the columbine, climbing
All at odds in their doing and undoing
All as one in the art of renewing
My love is a garden, sleeping
White frost is a blanket, creeping
After sleep, there is always a waking
And the sun comes with the dawn breaking
My love is a garden, growing
My friends are the wind in the trees, blowing
My hopes are the seeds in the breeze, unbinding
With a dream of a fuller garden finding
With a dream, with a hope, with my friends, with my love.... in a garden
JUST YOU AND ME
Sitting with you watching smoke curling gently
Catching diagonal rays of the sun
Floating through trees to dispel in the ether
Signalling that a new day has begun
Destiny's tapestries spin the day's pattern
God's in his heaven, a window on me
Everyone else is just anywhere else
But right here and right now
It's just you and me
Slowly we rise and walk down to the river
Feeling her life as it slips through our hands
Whispering tales from the hills of blue shadow
Then curious and quick rushes off to new lands
Climb with me love to the heart of the forest
Up through the ferns and the bracken so high
Transient pathways become sunlit highways
That lead us beneath the sweet arc of the sky
I WILL BE A STRANGER
Every step I take this night
Will take me deep into the moor
And the sun will set upon
Every path I crossed before
I will never come again
To make the fire upon the floor
I will be a stranger then
I will go deeper than before
I am no stranger to the moor
And I can see no head of land
Through the fog upon the moor
Through the fog upon the moor
Through the fog upon the moor
DANSE DU PAPILLON
Sur la gauche sur la droit,
toute en rond
Vivre la danse des papillons
Le seule qui toujours danse
Avec tant d'evidence
Le serpent il charme
mais le papillon desarme