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

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