Tuesday, October 19, 2010

25 Songs for 25 Years, no. 5

Before we got married, at our first Valentine's Day together, I made a card. Being a little on the dramatic side, I made a big one, 20" x 30" in size. I lettered it up with a bit of "Irish Traditional" poetry I found on the back of the Dexy's Midnight Runners LP, the one that had "Come On, Eileen" on it. It went:

Believe me, if all those endearing young charms
That I gaze on so fondly today
Were to change by tomorrow and flee from my arms
Like fairy gifts fading away
Thou would still be adored as this moment thou art
Let thy loveliness fade as it will
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still

A while later, Terri gave me a card that contained a bit of poetry by Thomas Moore, which said:

It is not while beauty and youth are thine own,
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear,
That the fervor and faith of a soul may be known,
To which time will but make thee more dear!
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets,
But as truly loves on to the close,
As the sunflower turns on her god when he sets
The same look which she turned when he rose!

Eventually we went looking for that poem by Thomas Moore, and discovered that the two poems were in fact two stanzas of the same poem, and that it was a traditional Irish song. It's the tune Bugs Bunny tries to play on the booby-trapped piano, but he always hits the wrong note, until Yosemite Sam shoves him out of the way, plays the tune correctly and blows himself up.

Those Endearing Young Charms, performed by Allison Krause.

1 comment:

Sarah said...

How wonderful that you both found verses from the same poem! You two were definitely on the same wavelength. (It also explains the similarity of the meter, which was obvious to me as I read them.)

Lovely.