Lyr/Tune ADD: When Poppies Close Their Eyes

Subject: Old Folk Song
From: GUEST,Barlow
Date: 23 Jan 08 - 01:57 PM

Looking for the music and lyrics to an old folk song used in Chicago elementry schools in the early part of 1952. I have the lyrics but I'm not sure they are correct. Need the music.

FIRST VERSE
When poppies close their crimson eyes
When ripples widen on the river
When swallows wheel in evening skies
When willows whisper silken sighs
My longing heart in fancy flies
To where snowcapped mountain rise

Happy trails,
Ben
[e-mail]

Subject: RE: Old Folk Song:Poppies Crimson Eyes
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 Jan 08 - 02:19 PM

This song is in "Singing Juniors, Songs for Youth," Pitts et al., Ginn & Co., about 1953.

Sorry, I don't have that song book. I see a copy selling for $1.00 through www.abebooks.com

Subject: RE: Old Folk Song: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: Joe Offer
Date: 24 Jan 08 - 04:15 PM

As you can see from the crosslinks above, we've discussed this song before but haven't found it in print yet. Tentatively, I'd say the song title is "When Poppies Close Their Eyes," so I've added that to the thread title. I think the Pitts songbook is in the Ginn textbook series called Our Singing World. I have three books in the Ginn series, but not that one.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Old Folk Song: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 24 Jan 08 - 09:15 PM

Joe, "Singing Juniors" was separate, 1953 (240pp.) and was reprinted in an enlarged edition in 1961 (270 + pages). It may be the same as "Singing Teen-Agers," in the Our Singing World Series, 1954 and 1961. I don't know if it is in the later edition, or whether it also appeared in "Our Singing World" Series.

These series can get most confusing!

Subject: RE: Old Folk Song: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jan 08 - 12:46 PM

Thanks for the help. I have some eueries out thru Abe's. I'll see where they lead.

Happy trails,
Ben

Subject: RE: Old Folk Song: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: Joe Offer
Date: 25 Jan 08 - 01:44 PM

Ben, if you get the book and can post the song, please do - note the crosslinks above for a link to the other thread on this song.

-Joe-

Subject: Lyr Add: WHEN POPPIES CLOSE THEIR EYES
From: Joe Offer
Date: 24 Jul 08 - 11:29 PM

Well, I don't believe in giving up. I bought the book, and found the song. I don't think it's an "old folk song," but it's a nice song.
-Joe-

WHEN POPPIES CLOSE THEIR EYES
(Christine Turner Curtis & Ruth McConn Spencer)

When poppies close their crimson eyes,
When ripples widen on the river,
When swallows wheel in evening skies,
When willows whisper silken sighs,
My longing heart in fancy flies
To where the snowcapped mountains rise.

I leave the Alpine village small.
I roam in mem'ry through the valleys.
I climb the snowy summits tall;
I see the purple shadows crawl.
I see the starry evening fall
Upon the snowcapped mountain wall.


Source: Singing Juniors, page 109 published by Ginn & Co., 1961. Edited by Lila Belle Pitts, Mabelle Glenn, Lorrain Watters, and Louis G. Wersen.

Ben, your memory served you well - you missed only one word and an "s" in the last line of the first verse.
-Joe-

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Click to play

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: GUEST,tsnap
Date: 18 Sep 08 - 06:16 PM

i learned it slightly differently, in kansas city in about 1959

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: GUEST,Joe Offer, at the Women's Center
Date: 18 Sep 08 - 07:27 PM

Hi, tsnap - can you tell us the version you learned?
We have the printed version I posted above (attributed to Christine Turner Curtis & Ruth McConn Spencer), but we still don't know where the song came from originally. I think perhaps that Curtis and Spence adapted it from a European song.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: Joe Offer
Date: 03 Dec 08 - 08:38 PM

Tune added.

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Click to play

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: GUEST,Peter Asher
Date: 03 Nov 13 - 01:35 AM

I learned and sang this in grade school in the early forties.

Never forgot it. Always thought it was a Swiss folk song.

I know the tune by heart and can sing or whistle it.

Not sure how to communicate that, never done You-Tube etc.

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Oct 16 - 03:00 PM

The song was originally written by Christina Rossetti.

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: GUEST
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 11:17 AM

I remember reading in the song book, that the song came from Naples Itally

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: GUEST,peter asher
Date: 07 Feb 22 - 09:39 PM

I remember the last line as --Upon the coal black mountain wall

Subject: RE: Lyr/Tune Req: When Poppies Close Their Eyes
From: leeneia
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 01:52 PM

The song was in circulation in 1944. This is from Long Island, near New York City.

https://nyshistoricnewspapers.org/lccn/sn83030960/1944-11-16/ed-1/seq-7/