Subject: ADD: Ballad of the White Seal Maid (Yolen/Collins)
From:
Joe Offer
Date: 13 Jul 16 - 04:22 PM
Based on the posts above and punctuation I've added, here's a corrected version:
THE BALLAD OF THE WHITE SEAL MAID
(words by Jane Yolen, music by Lui Collins)
There's a fisherman sitting alone on the land,
His hands are his craft, his boat is his art;
A fisherman sitting alone on the land,
A rock, a hard rock in his heart.
There's a selkie maid swimming alone in the bay,
Her eyes are the seals, her heart is the sea;
A selkie maid swimming alone in the bay,
A pure white seal maiden is she.
She comes to the shore and she sheds her sealskin,
She dances on the sand, dances under the moon;
Her hair falls in waves down upon her white skin,
And only the seals hear the tune.
[verse of la-da improvisation]
Then standing, the fisherman takes her sealskin,
Staking his claim to a wife from the sea;
He raises his hand holding up the white skin,
Says, "Now you must come home with me."
Oh, weeping she goes, and still weeping she stays,
Her hands are her craft, her babes are her art;
A year, and a year, and a year more she stays,
A rock, a cold rock in her heart.
But what is this hid in the fisherman's bag?
It smells of the ocean, it feels like the sea;
A bonny white sealskin, closed up in the bag,
And never a tear more cries she.
Goodbye to the house and goodbye to the shore,
Goodbye to the babes that I never could claim;
But never a thought to the man left on shore,
For selkie's my nature and name.
She puts on her skin and dives back in the sea,
The fisherman's cry falls on water-deaf ears;
She swims in her sealskin away out to sea,
And the fisherman drowns in his tears.
from the Lui Collins album, There's a Light (2011)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrPaQKFipLA
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sj
