The Salley Gardens

"The Sally Gardens" is a poem published in 1889 by Irish poet, William Butler Yeats.  (13 June 1865 – 28 January 1939). Yeats indicated in a note that the poem was "an attempt to reconstruct an old song from three lines imperfectly remembered by an old peasant woman in the village of  Ballisodare, Sligo, who often sang them to herself." The composer John Ireland set the words to an original melody.  See video below under Harp Demo.

The Salley Gardens

(Salley in Irish means Willow.)

Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white
feet.
She bid me take love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish, with her would not
agree.
In a field by the river my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder she laid her snow-white
hand.
She bid me take life easy, as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish, and now am full of tears.