![]() |
Church of St. Thomas Becket ~ Skeffington, England
"Skeffington was Rafferty's mother's maiden name." |
Mary Skeffington
Mary Skeffington, close your eyes
And make believe that you are just a girl again
Go to sleep tonight, dream of days
When you had something there to light the way.
Remember a holiday
in a north-of-England town
You slept in a room upstairs
on a bed of eiderdown.
Mary Skeffington, when you wake
You mustn't be afraid to face another day
Think of what you have, you'll get by
You've always been a lady
so hold your head up high.
Look back on a home where you spent
the best years of your life
Remember the man who asked you
if you would be his wife.
Mary Skeffington, close your eyes
And make believe that you are just a girl again
Go to sleep tonight, dream of days
When you had something there to light the way. (1971)
Gerry Rafferty (1947 – 2011)
Scottish singer, songwriter, musician
Also sung by Oliva Newton-John
And a haunting poem for a summer night . . .
to put you in the mind of Wuthering Heights
and ghosts of youth:
Sonnet #43
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950)
from her collection
The Ballad of Harp-Weaver and Other Poems
More poems: QK & FN & KL