Lyr Add: The Easter Tree (Dave Goulder)

Subject: LYR ADD:
From: Mark Pemburn
Date: 15 Sep 97 - 07:43 PM

Rain falls upon the Easter tree
The squirrel shakes his head and shivers in his red and sodden fur
The wind and water flatten out his ears and cause his streaming eyes to close
The smell of death is heavy in his nose

The sun dries out the Easter tree
The rabbit looks around sees a shadow on the ground and runs for home
The songbird finds a strange and novel perch to shout his challenge to the day
The hair beneath his feet is turning grey

A man hangs from the Easter tree
His deathbped is a rope, four strong nails have killed his hope of climing down
His jaws are locked in agony, are open for the flies to come and go
His eyes are in the belly of the crow

A dog sits by the Easter tree
Beneath the naked heels his master or his meal will surely fall
When the rope is broken by the wind or the rusty nails release their withered load
The dog, well fed, continues down the road

Bones lie beneath the easter tree
The skull's now full of sand could never understand the reason why
The thread of life was broken by a hand that never cared to know their names
They played and lost in someone else's game

The leaves upon the Easter tree
Are red with human blood since justice chose the wood to make a sword
When a man was hanged at Tyburn tree or crucified along the road to Rome
His blood and tears have stained the face of stone

Transcribed from "Ashes and Diamonds" -- June Tabor (1977) From an old English song. The "Tyburn tree" was a euphemism for "gallows tree" in England in past centuries.

Subject: RE: LYR ADD:
From: Mark Pemburn
Date: 15 Sep 97 - 07:52 PM

Forgot to add the title: it is called "The Easter Tree". I've been able to find remarkably little about this song in my researches and would appreciate any comments.

Mark

Subject: RE: LYR ADD:
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 15 Sep 97 - 11:39 PM

Mark- Don't know the song, but Tyburn Tree refers to the gallows at Tyburn. Song seems fairly (1960s or later) modern, though.

Subject: RE: LYR ADD:
From: Bruce
Date: 16 Sep 97 - 11:32 AM

The last execution at Tyburn was in 1783, and like Dick I would judge this to have been written only about 190 years later. This smacks more of Franz Kafka than old English.

Subject: RE: LYR ADD:
From:
Date: 17 Sep 97 - 06:18 PM

The Tyburn gallows from the references I've read was not a tree or even a gallows as we think of it, but a sort of tripod arrangement. (There is such a reference in Shakespeare, which I cannot find at the moment)

The unfortunates used to be brought in a kind of procession from Newgate Prison, cheered if they were popular and pelted with filth if they weren't. When they stopped using Tyburn they just hanged the people outside of the prison, and eventually inside the prison walls. Newgate prison stood where the Old Bailey courthouse is now -- Central Criminal Court I think is the proper name.

I assume that the Easter Tree must be Christ's cross.

Subject: RE: LYR ADD:
From: Peter T.
Date: 17 Sep 97 - 06:35 PM

Just to note that I believe William Blake in 1800 - 1820 made the connection between London's Tyburn, the Crucifixion, and the road to Rome in his later poems (Milton, Jerusalem), although I don't recall the road to Rome too clearly (obviously Spartacus). But certainly Rome. This was part of his equating the Druids and human sacrifice with the Romans as examples of priesthood. This may be behind part of this poem. Yours, Peter

Subject: RE: LYR ADD:
From: Barry
Date: 17 Sep 97 - 10:22 PM

"Strait to Newgate I was bound & by the laws convicted To hang from Tyburn tree my fate, at which I'm much afrighted." 'Allen Tyne Of Harrow' Barry