A Wedding Song (Away the Winter)
In May shall be her wedding day,
When hawthorn blooms do scent the air,
And she will dance in fine array,
With fragrant flowers pinned in her hair.
Away the winter, come the spring,
She waits to wear her lover’s ring.
Away the winter come the spring,
She waits to hear the church bells ring.
The yuletide earth of hard-set ice
Has nights too long and clocks tick slow.
If Chronos she could but entice,
To forward fast to spring’s soft glow.
Away the winter, come the spring,
She waits to wear her lover’s ring.
Away the winter come the spring,
She waits to hear the church bells ring.
When Hades has Persephone,
The silent trees are bare and cold.
Return Demeter’s girl early
And leaves will sway in sunshine’s hold.
Away the winter, come the spring,
She waits to wear her lover’s ring.
Away the winter come the spring,
She waits to hear the church bells ring.
Isabella Simmonds is a British musician and piano teacher living in London.
Isabella, this is a precious song sung sensitively and melodiously with what I presume is your beautiful voice. It is like a pre-wedding ballad that is enchanting and evocative. Thank you for letting us read and hear it. It felt like a song minstrels from the British past would have loved to sing.
Thank you so much Roy! I am so very pleased you enjoyed the song and my performance of it. Yes, I have written it in a traditional folk song style as I have always enjoyed singing folk songs; they offer such a wealth of wonderful melodies and stories.
FYI: I have been a singer/entertainer and really love your song and singing. I expect to post a poem soon about being sent to London for a military conference and performing with buskers in Leicester Square. There are many facets to my story. I also sang a song I wrote without accompaniment on this site a few years ago titled, “Tucson Sunday Morning.” I have written about 150 songs.
That’s great to know Roy! 150 songs! That’s amazing! I haven’t written very many myself.
I really look forward to reading your new poem set in London and I will have a look for “Tucson Sunday Morning”.
What a breathtakingly beautiful performance.
Thank you for your lovely comment
This is a beautiful piece, in the true style of the English folk song. A number of the vowel sounds are extended by a short melisma in Isabella’s performance, giving the song a genuinely traditional feeling.
I’m delighted that you found it beautiful! Thank you very much.
Beautifully written and performed, Isabella!
Thank you very much Paul!
I enjoyed listening to your song. Thank you for sharing it with us.
I’m very pleased you enjoyed my song. Thank you for reading and listening to it.
Wonderful, Isabella.
Thank you very much Paul.
Lest you had any doubts about it, everything written above by those who commented is absolutely true. You are a breath of spring air.
Oh what a truly lovely comment! Thank you so much! It is most appreciated.
It’s a lovely song, Isabella. Hearing the performance supplies the rhythm to the text, as often in the case of songs that don’t fully come to life without their music. The text does, however, develop the story. With first stanza and chorus, it seems like a simple country ditty. But when “Chronos” is mentioned in the second stanza, with the wish to entice him forward, there’s more of a sense of the prospective bride’s impatience. And with Hades and Persephone and Demeter in the third stanza, the impatience becomes an imperative “Return” demanding the restoration of spring. The country girl dramatically does “Away” with her “waiting”!
Thank you so much Margaret! I am so pleased you found the song lovely. I am also greatly appreciative of the attention you gave to the text of the song.
Please sing more of your poems. This is so beautiful.
Thank you very much Daniel, I am so pleased you found it beautiful.