“Awake Awake (Awake Sweet England)”
Description
"Awake, awake, sweet England, sweet England now awake, And do your prayers obediently." Listeners are told to repent, reminded that worms will eventually eat their flesh, reminded that wealth is useless after death, and blessed
Supplemental text
Awake Awake (Awake Sweet England)
Partial text(s)
*** A ***
Awake, Awake
From Ella Mary Leather, Folk-Lore of Herefordshire, pp. 194-195.
From the singing of Caroline Bridges, collected at Pembridge,
July 1909.
Awake, awake, sweet England, sweet England now awake,
And do your prayers obediently, and to your soul partake;
Our Lord our God is calling, all in the sky so clear,
So repent, repent, sweet England, for dreadful days draw near;
Let us pray, and it's to the living Lord let us pray.
(3 additional stanzas)
Notes
Several verses of this are shared with "The Moon Shines Bright (The Bellman's Song)," and they probably have some sort of common ancestry. But this strikes me as even more gloomy somehow. - RBW
Cross references
- cf. "The Moon Shines Bright (The Bellman's Song)" (lyrics)
References
- Leather, pp. 194-195, "Awake, Awake" (1 text, 1 tune)
- ST Leath194 (Partial)
- Roud #2111
- BI, Leath194