The Telling of O-E Dalley

©1972 Bok

        

They say the seats come up, you know, and they do:
come out of the water and become a man,
the grey seals.
And they say if you can catch one, you'll never find
a better man to you, for he'll, take the money-hunger
from you, and the fear of dying from you,
and give you peace.

There was a woman who fell in love with a seal,
and his calling was 0-E-Dalley. But she couldn't
hold him, she couldn't keep him, and he went away
from her, and went back to the sea.

Ivor the Driver

O-E Dallay (The Song)

©1972 Bok

        

Lathan mo run
O-E-Dallay, lathan.
the Telling of O-E-Dallay
Wind west and tide westing:
O-E-Dallay, lathan,
Lo Lathan, mo run.

Down on the wave
O-E-Dallay, lathan,
Wind west and tide westing:
Came he by day, singing
Lo lathan, mo run.

I gave to him
All in my heart's keeping.
He gave to me, 'Laughing,
Sea shells and sea's yearning
. Lo lathan, mo run.

I gave to him
All in my heart's morning.
He gave to me, weeping,
A baby died borning.
Lo lathan, mo run.

October wind
O-E-Dallay, lathan,
Wind west and tide westing:
And I go down, running.
Lo lathan, mo run. There was no one there
O-E-Dallay, lathan,
Only the seal crying,
O-E-Dallay, lathan,
Lo lathan, mo run.

There was no one
O-E-Dallay, lathan,
Only the seal crying.
O-E-Dallay, lathan,
Lo lathan, mo run.

Go Thou, Long-Legs

Go Thou, Long-Legs

©Bok

        

Go thou, Long-Legs,
go up the windey way.
Go from the white way where your mother made you.
See how the nearing sun
calls to your feary eyes,
calls to the blood in your high head,
long-legs.

Go thou, sea-child,
way up the windy way.
Go from the still way where your mother found you.
See how the little moon
rides on your shoulder,
chilling the blood in your sad head,
sea child.

Go thou, strong-hand,
go to the twisty tree.
Break him, bind him: tell him his master.
Soon from the high tree
building another tree,
building a tree for another god,
strong-hand.

(Soonday, then:
leave the twisty tree alone.)

Go thou, white-head,
go from the cold bed.
Go from the slow wave where your mother left you.
See how the old sun,
sun and the terried moon
run from the might of your reaching,
white-head.

(Sila is not gone away, sea-child,
wind-child.
Sila is not hid from you.)

Come thou, sea-child,
home from the feary lands,
home from the burnt sky where your mother sent you.
Sila is here, child,
all o'er the windy world:
all, and in peace, and forever still,
sea-child.

An Diran Than Soulder

An Diran Than Soulder

©Bok

        One came back to the sea, and died there. This is a lament, a crying for him.

An diran than soulder,
An diran than soulder:
The tide at thy head and feet,
The wind about thy shoulder.

Though the song should know thy fame,
Though the wind bring back thy name,
They'll not bring thee home again
That walked the seas in sorrow.

An diran than soulder,
An diran than soulder:
The tide at thy head and feet,
The wind about thy shoulder.

Far from me is singing gone,
Far from me is laughter gone:
They can never bring thee home
That walked the seas in sorrow.

An diran than soulder,
An diran than soulder:
The tide at thy head and feet,
The wind about thy shoulder.

Now the deep a home for thee,
Now the seal thy keeper be,
Now the sea-bird hear thy cry
That walked the seas in sorrow.

An diran than soulder,
An diran than soulder:
The tide at thy head and feet,
The wind about thy shoulder.

Call the wild and stepping sea,
Call the wave to comfort thee:
May she bear thee peacefully
The windy world over.

An diran than soulder,
An diran than soulder:
The tide at thy head and feet,
The wind about thy shoulder.

Hadjenek-The Snow That Comes

Hadjenek-The Snow That Comes

©Bok

        Hadjenek was a man, then, and he lived in
the cold land, waiting for his people to come
and take him home.

He was not a good man; he tried to be,
but he was all alone.

But he had seen the woman Djiril,
and he wanted her.
He tried to make her come to him;
he didn't know she was a seal.

Before the snows, before the sea was white,
old Hadjenek came out of his house, and he was hungry
He saw the Dureg-seal on the ledge before him,
and he said: - Why do you come here?
But this Dureg-seal said to him: - I take fish to eat. Come and eat with me.

But Hadjenek was too proud for that.
and began to fish by himself. He sat
and fished like a great white bear.

But Dureg went into the water, and took the fish
where he swam, and before the sun had moved
he was filled with fish, but Hadjenek had taken
only four.

Dureg came out of the water, and he was a man.
Hadjenek sat on the ledge by himself, and he was hungry.
He said: - Mednanda, I can't live here in this cold,
nor can I fish. Get some fish for me: I'm hungry.

Dureg was still, and the sun moved. He said:
--I don't want to get fish for you; I think you are always hungry.
--Then go and get the woman Djiril; maybe she will fish for me.

Dureg went into the water, and the sun moved again.

* * *

The waves came. Hadjenek was up in the field,
looking for food.
The waves went away again.

* * *

Then Hadjenek heard the calling
and he went down to the water.
Duree came out of the water, and he was a man. He said: I brought Djiril. Tell her
what you want.

Hadjenek looked out on the land, but he saw
no Djiril, so he called to her:
Oh, Djiril is kind, they say,
Djiril is beautiful, too,
but I don't see her

. And that was true; he couldn't see her. He looked
out on the land and out on the water, and still
he saw no Djiril; all he could see was the head of
a seal in the third wave, watching.
So he called again:
Oh, Djiril is kind, they say,
Djiril is beautiful, too, but I don't see her.
All I do see, in the wave before me, is a little
seal with a grey head, watching.
Why do I see no woman walking?

The seal stayed between waves, but she sang to him:
Kayou, yethaa. O, ythyree, Gedanda:
All I do see walking before me:
hunger and shouting,
sorrow and weeping,
though I do hear no man speaking.

Hadjenek heard her, then, but he didn't understand,
so he called again:
Oh, Djiril, grey grows the eastwind, blowing.
Snow comes, and wind, to fill my door.
Cold is my house, now, and poor,
and fish nor friend have I
to keep me.

The seal stayed between waves, and the sun
moved behind her. But then she sang to him:
Kayou, yethaa. o, ythyllee, Gedanda:
Grey grows the eastwind, blowing.
Snow comes, and wind, to fill your door.
Would I stay in snow and wind
when all the seas are warm?

Then Hadjenek knew it was the Djiril-seal,
and he was sad. But still he called to her:
Oh, Mednanda, listen to me:
Before this land, before this water,
another land, another water.
Houses I see, like ships-on-end
with gold and silver; warm and shining.
A ship I see, and it comes to take me.
It comes to take you, too;
come with me.

Djiril listened to him then, and the sun moved
above her. She came into the next wave,
and she sang to him:
Kayou, yethaa. O, ythyree, Gedanda:
After this water, after this land,
another land made of water.
I have seen a ship-on-end:
very deep, the whale beside her.
Nothing warm there, nothing shining.
The ship with the wind-oar
sleeps in the sea.

Then Hadjenek knew that his ship was gone,
and he was afraid, and he got angry.
He went down on the ledge and said to her:
No, Mednanda: hunger and cold,
these are cruel things.
But I did ask for beauty and was given
only mockery. When I asked for kindness:
sorrow and drowning.
There is no kindness in this land, no beauty.
All I see now, in the wave before me
is an ugly seal, with a grey head, laughing.

Djiril listened to him then, and the sun moved before her.
And she came into the first wave, and sang to him:
Kayou, yethaa. o, ythyree, Gedanda:
I did not ask for beauty,
nor was it given me.
Sorrow I cannot give you,
for it is sunk in the sea.
I was not told of kindness ever,
only of hunger.
I did not ask for a master,
nor with fish will I feed one.

When Hadjenek heard that, he was filled with anger,
and he took up a great rock from the sea-ledge
and he threw it at the Djiril-seal,
and the rock did kill her.

And then he sat down on the sea-rock and wept,
and the sun went away,
and it was cold.

* * * The snow that comes, blowing down the bay,
makes the islands blind.
Man is born with snow in his eyes.

The white bear fishes from the ledge,
The seal beside him:
The seal is blind
But the white bear is born without eyes.

The seal will go wherever seas
Are turning;
The white bear will die in the hills.

All life that comes to us, turning,
comes in burning to the earth and lives burning.
Turns then, and burns no more.

We were the leaning trees we loved, andiranda,
we were the hills and grasses, and we are:
given to them, as they were given.

Now the years run, turning:
earth slows her turning to the sun.
Slow turns the ice to come again.

Now are good things come and gone, andiranda;
gone soon the man and all the dreaming.
Still turn the seas from land to land.

Only the turning seas remain.

Andiranda (the turning):
the telling of Djiril's Hymn.

Jute Mill Song (Mary Brookbank)

Djiril's Hymn

© Gordon Bok, BMI

 

from the cantefable Seal Djiril's Hymn, recorded on the album Seal Djiril's Hymn, (p) © 1972 Folk-Legacy Records, Inc

 

Long are the days gone, andiranda,

Long down the sad and windy years;

Long from the land of our desire

 

Rain comes and wind and snow, andiranda,

Stormcloud and squall do shroud the sea

And peace shall follow us no more.

 

Now through the hollowing green wave we wander,

Long down the stormy seas, and sad,

Long from the land of our desire.

 

Years when the sun was our provider,

Milk of the meadows gathering.

Winds brought the riches to our door.

 

Now are the days come, andiranda,

When to the seas again we go:

Now do we cry for those green years.

 

Why, when the winnowing sun was keeping

All of our harvest and our toil,

Made we no peace among our kind?

 

Why, when the summering wave was swinging,

And all our hills and trees were green,

Did we not sow our fields with love?

 

Jute Mill Song (Mary Brookbank)

Dillan Bay

© 1965 Gordon Bok, BMI

 

Who's to tell you where you come from?  If your days were fair before you heard the ticking of other people's clocks, if you can remember what you saw and loved when only the sun or the tides governed you, that should be where you come from. 

 

Dillan Bay, laddie-o,

dillan-dau, laddie-ay,

Dillan Bay, laddie-o,

all the boats are gone.

 

            Gone away, laddie-o,

            gone awa', laddie-ay,

            gone away, laddie-o,

            with their topsails high.

 

                        Topsail high, laddie-o,

                        topsail low, laddie-ay,

                        topsail high, laddie-o,

                        when the wind's away.

 

                                    Wind's away, laddie-o,

                                    wind's awa', laddie-ay,

                                    wind's away, laddie-o,

                                    down in Dillan Bay.

 

                                                Dillan Bay, laddie-o,

                                                dillan-dau, laddie-ay,

                                                Dillan Bay, laddie-o,

                                                all the boats are gone.

 

 

 

 

 

Jute Mill Song (Mary Brookbank)

La Brigantine 

Word: Rudyard Kipling;  Music:© 1964, 1992 Gordon Bok, BMI

 

The Canadian French often preferred the brigantine rig to the schooner, for cargo and fishing.  Here they speak of it as the ship of death:  a funeral chant.

 

I learned it when I was quite young, but forgot he melody, so I asked Shirley Ruffalo (Brown) to read it for me, and took the shape of this tune from her inflection.

 

La Brigantine qui va tourner,                          The Brigantine that goes,

Roule et s'incline                                     rolling and pitching,

Pour m'entraîner.                                           takes me with it.

 

Ah, Vierge Marie,                                      Oh, Virgin Mary,

Pour moi priez-Dieu;                                        pray to God for me.

Adieu, Patrie,                                                   Goodbye, my country;

Québec, adieu.                                                 Goodbye, Quebec.

 

Bheir Me O

Bheir Me O

©Trad. Hebrides

        My aunt Beanto (Boericke) Cohen gave me this lovely thing. She sang me many songs from the Scottish Hebrides when I was growing up - to help me keep my feet off the ground, I think.

Bheir me O, horo van-oh,
Bheir me O, horo van-ee.
Bheir me o, o hooro ho,
Sad am I without thee.

Thou'rt the music of my heart,
Harp of joy, o cruit mo ahruidh,
Moon of guidanae by night,
Strength and light thou'rt to me.

In the morning, when I go
To the white and shining sea,
In the calling of the seal
Thy soft calling to me.

When I'm lonely, dear white heart,
Black the night and wild the sea;
By love's light my foot finds
The old pathway to thee.

The Banks of The Reedy Lagoon

The Banks of The Reedy Lagoon

©Trad. Australian

        .I learned this from Mr. and Mrs. Ray Wales, of Australia. He said a reedy lagoon would be on a bend in a river, where it shoals off into marshes. This old character has holed up there for the winter, and now he's thinking about his friends; a little Spring-lonely, perhaps, but not really sad.

The sweet scented wattle sheds perfume around,
Delighting the bird and the bee ,
While I tie and take rest in me fern-covered nest
In the shade of the currajong tree
High up in the air I can hear the refrain
Of a butcherbird* piping his tune,
For the Spring in her glory has come back again
To the banks of the Reedy Lagoon.

I've carried me bluey for many a mile,
Me boots are worn out at the toes,
And I'm dressing this season in different style
Than what I did last year, God knows.
My cooking u ensils, I'm sorry to say,
Consist of a knife and a spoon,
And I've dry bread and tea in a battered Jack Shea
By the banks of the Reedy Lagoon.

Oh, where is young Frankie? (And how he could ride!)
And Johnny, the light-hearted boy ?
They tell me that lately he's taken a bride,
A benedict's life to enjoy.
And Mac, the big Scotsman; I once heard him say
He'd wrestled the famous Muldoon . . .
But they're all gone away and it's lonely, today,
By the banks of the Reedy Lagoon.

And where is the lady I oftened caressed,
The girl with the sad, dreamy eyes?
She pillows her head on another man's breast
Who tells her the very same lies.
My bed she would hardly be willing to share
Where I camp by the light of the moon,
But it's little I care, for I'd never keep 'square'
By the banks of the Reedy Lagoon.

* Capt. Kendall Morse tells me that this is our shrike.

Paloma

Paloma

©Trad., Yaqui

        "Paloma" is a Yaqui Indian dance tune from Northwest Mexico. It has three basic parts, delightfully interrelated and quite powerful. The third part is usually played many times, but in the same octave, whereas I let the guitar take it into the bass, the harp's territory. It's the kind of song that, when played for 20 - 30 minutes, becomes more and mo re beautiful and mesmerizing.

Hatu Khara Ols'n

Hatu Khara Ols'n

(The Hard Black Rope)

Traditional

 

This is a song from the Khalmyk (Buryat Mongol) people who came to live in Philadelphia and New Jersey beginning in the 1950s.  I learned it from my friends Sara Stepkin Goripow and Nadja Stepkin Budschalow during the winters that I worked in Philadelphia and sang with them and played in their dance-orchestra.

 

They told me it was "a very young song song (less than 200 years old, probably) and very Russian."  It came from a time when they were hauling boats up rivers – by hand.  Nadja said, "You could call it our 'Volga Boat Song.'" Many of the words are lost to present day Khalmyk, but (loosely) it goes:  "I pull the hard, black rope (and I sing) Mother/ Father/ my People/ my Country: I do not forget you."  I have the 3rd verse in Nadja's writing : "While this river runs, while you work here, don't forget your people."

 

Ordinarily I would never harmonize a Khalmyk song, but wherever the Stepkin sisters sang this one, they sang it in harmony… so I have it a Russian flavor here for the Quasimodals, and have tried to teach them the Khalmyk sounds that are not so easy to remember from all those years ago. 

 

The Quasimodal Chorus

 

Hatuya khara olsigen

Hakurun badje tatulav

Hakurun badje tatulav

 

Hakurun badje tatushen

Harm stele edje minye sanugdna

Harm stele edje minye sanugdna

 

Idjelinye irgede kudlagen

Izhe lan biche martite

Izhe lan biche martite

 

Idjelinye irgede kudlushen

Inyegem ondzin nandan sanugdna

Inyegem ondzin nandan sanugdna

 

 

 

THE BRANDY TREE

THE BRANDY TREE

©1967 Gordon Bok, BMI

 

Gordon – Vocal and Spanish guitar

Women’s chorus.

These are the women who came to speak Captive Water: poets, painters, farmers, teachers, therapists, mothers, folks you'll find in your community, too – fine uncommon people.

 

I got most of this song from a small otter who used to hang out in the same woods I did, around Sherman's Point, many years ago. Many folks have asked me about the name of the song: I was never sure of what that word was, (Bandy Tree, Bundy Tee?) nor do I think it matters. I've come to think of it as a place inside ourselves where, once we've been there, we know how to find it again.

 

I go down to the brandy tree and take my nose and my tail with me

All for the world and the wind to see and never come back no more

 

Down the meadowmarsh deep and wide, tumble the tangle by my side

All for the westing wind to ride and slide in the summer rain

            Sun come follow my happy way, wind come walk beside me

            Moon on the mountain go with me, a wondrous way I know

 

I go down to the windy sea and the little gray seal will play with me

Slide on the rock and dive in the bay and sleep on the ledge at night

            But the seal don't try to tell me how to fish in the windy blue

            Seal's been fishing for a thousand years and he knows that I have too

 

When the frog goes down to the mud to sleep and the lamprey hides in the boulders deep

I take my nose and my tail and go a hundred thousand hills

            Sun come follow my happy way, wind come walk beside me

            Moon on the mountain go with me, a wondrous way I know

 

Some day down by the brandy tree I'll hear the shepherd call for me

Call me to leave my happy ways and the shining world I know

            Sun on the hill come go with me, my days have all been free

            The pipes come laughing down the wind and that's the way I go

            That's the way for me

 

 

Turn Ye To Me

Turn Ye To Me

©Words by John Wilson (Christopher North) 1785-1854

        A beautiful song I learned as a child, but kept forgetting how beautiful it was, so I must thank Lainie Snow Porter and Dr. Sandy Ives for giving it back to me. The time you think of this one is when you're out off the islands on a grey winter afternoon, and it is starting to snow. You look up from the chart and there's a grey old ledge sneaking by in the gloom, with a gull standing on it. He's not doing anything, just staring off at nothing, and the cold swell sliding over his toes. You know that if he doesn't feel like going all the way home before dark it won't matter much to him, he can just go off and set down on a wave somewhere, comb a little· more oil into his feathers, squat his head down and go to sleep. And that wave could be anywhere in the world. Well, it won't do for dark to catch you out there, so you roll her off for home and your warm bedroom and pretty curtained windows - but somehow the gull has taken a bit of the reality off it for you.

The stars are shining cheerily, cheerily;
Horo, Mhairi-Dhu: turn ye to me.
The seabird is crying wearily, wearily;
Horo, Mhairi-Dhu: turn ye to me.

Cold are the stormwinds that ruffle his breast,
But warm are the downy plumes lining his nest.
Cold blows the storm there, soft falls the snow there;
Horo, Mhairi-Dhu: turn ye to me.

The waves are driving wearily, wearily;
Horo, Mhairi-Dhu, turn ye to me.
The seabird is crying drearily, drearily;
Horo, Mhairi-Dhu: turn ye to me.

Hushed be thy moaning, lone bird of the sea:
Thy home on the rock is a shelter to thee.
Thy home is the angry wave, mine but the lonely grave;
Horo, Mhairi-Dhu: turn ye to me.