Bless Ye Fair Maids

Words: © 1984 J.B. Goodenough

Music: © 1990 Gordon Bok

 

Judy sent this to me many years ago, as we were trading poems.  It worked on me until I found this tune and harmony for it.  I used to play the bass part on the 'cellamba and sing the upper part, but it took the January Men to give it the freedom it wanted.  Cindy added the harmony on the last chorus.

 

The January Men

 

The candle's at the window and the sun is in the West

And the baby's in the cradle and the bird is on the nest

The young man's gone a-courting but the old man's home to stay

And in the fire's failing light we heard the old man say

 

            Bless ye the setting of the sun, the candle set at foot and head

            And bless ye fair maids, every one, that never came to warm my bed

 

Farewell whatever salty seas I never sailed upon

Farewell whatever roads that go where I have never gone

Farewell a hundred fallow fields that never did I plow

Farewell a hundred distant hills that I shall not climb now

 

Farewell to every tree whose fruit I never gathered up

Farewell to every jug in town that never filled my cup

Farewell the rivers fair and far that never I have crossed

And farewell the gold I never found and the silver I have lost

 

 

Bless Ye Fair Maids is recorded on the album Dear To Our Island