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Timothy Hoekman
Timothy Hoekman Music
She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not (cycle)
A romantic song cycle about loving someone but not always being loved back.
baritone and piano
A romantic song cycle about loving someone but not always being loved back.
1. The Lover Praises His Lady’s Bright Beauty
2. When She Came Not
3. The Lover Scorns All Women But His Lady
4. Her Way with My Dreams
Composer’s Notes
The poems of “She Loves Me, She Loves Me Not” are taken from a slim volume of poetry called Jealous of Dead Leaves, written by Shaemas O’Sheel. This American poet was born James Shields in 1886 in New York City, but was so interested in his Irish heritage that he changed his name to an anglicized spelling of its Irish version. These four poems often have an irregular meter and rhyme scheme, which makes for interesting musical phrase lengths at times. The poems themselves are filled with vivid images and heartfelt sentiments. Textually, the four songs are tied together by the theme of a man speaking of being loved or not loved by a woman whom he idolizes. This song cycle was premiered at Florida State University in 2015 by baritone Daniel Belcher and pianist Timothy Hoekman.
– Timothy Hoekman
Text
1. The Lover Praises His Lady’s Bright Beauty
Some night I think if you should walk with me
Where the tall trees like ferns on the ocean’s floor
Sway slowly in the blue deeps of the moon’s flood,
I would put up my hands through that impalpable sea
And tear a branch of stars from the sky, as once I tore
A branch of apple blossoms for you in an April wood.
And I would bend the dewy branch of stars about your little head
Till they flamed with pride to be as blossoms amid your hair,
But I would laugh to see them so pale, being near your eyes.
I would say to you “Love, the Immortals are hovering about your head,
They laugh at the dimness of stars in the luminous night of your hair.”
I would toss that weeping branch back to the mournful skies.
2. When She Came Not
I thought I heard her when the wind would pass
Down through the pine trees and the tangled grass,
I thought I heard her tremulously near
When no sound was.
I thought I heard her little feet
Over the wave-washed pebbles beat
And that I need but lift mine eyes
And see her there without surprise.
I thought, alas!
That she was tremulously near
When no sound was,
And raised my head and threw my arms apart.
But she
Was nowhere ‘twixt the forest and the sea.
3. The Lover Scorns All Women But His Lady
Were all the women of the world to come
And droop their languorous hair about my heart,
They could not hold it in those nets so fine,
And pleading with lips lyrical or dumb,
Pleading with excess of all amorous art,
They could not win the kisses that are thine.
If Helen came, her white limbs hung with gold,
And Deirdre with dim visionary eyes,
And Grania, flame-haired, fiery with command;
If Hero came—reluctant once of old—
And she who all too long with Romeo lies,
And she who led Dante heavenward by the hand,
They could not make me fain of their fain lips
Nor lure me to the languor of warm breasts
With any soft compulsion of white arms,
And delicate dim touch of finger tips
And smouldering eyes where passion leaps and rests
Would leave me cold and lose the name of charms.
Nay, Solomon’s Love and Anthony’s Desire,
Heloise and frail Francesca, and their queen
Immortal Aphrodite, whom I praise,
Naked before me could not touch with fire
The calm pulse of my blood, for I have seen
Beauty within thy beauty for all days.
4. Her Way with My Dreams
The wind stirs the tangle of her tresses where she stands.
She stoops and gathers in rose-pale hands
A myriad grains of the drifting sands.
Musing, she sifts them through fingers slim:
The wind whirls them seaward, a current dim.
They are soon forgotten, as any whim.
She gathered my dreams as the drifting sands,
Gently, as one who understands:
She scattered them with rose-white hands.
– Shaemas O’Sheel
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