I HAVE NEVER GIVEN MY SOUL TO THE KEEPING OF AN EARTHLY BODY
by: Elsa Barker (1869-1954)
- HAVE never given my soul to the keeping of an earthly body,
- And so I can sing at all times and seasons.
- If I choose one time in preference to another, that is the privilege of caprice.
- All along the roads of the fourth dimension are messengers watching for me;
- When my voice is heard they hasten to call their lords.
- I have sung in courts and camps, at the bivouac of the unborn, and in the hearts of men and angels.
- Whatever room I choose as a concert-chamber is soon hung with arras.
- Once I sang in a pine-grove, and the trees all shed their needles with regret that I went away.
- When I come to sing in your chamber, leave a crack of the window open,
- That I may go and leave you when you want me most to stay.
"I Have Never Given My Soul to the Keeping of an Earthly Body" is reprinted from Songs of a Vagrom Angel. Elsa Barker. New York: Mitchell Kennerley, 1916. |
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