Song, Chant, Poetry, Stories and Satire for the Pagan Community

This entry made: 12/21/1999

Title: The Lady's Bransle
Lyrics by: Glenn Turner and Hope Athearn
Tune: "Nonesuch"
Date: 1969
Source: http://www.conjure.com/TRINE/lyric.html
Recorded on: "Songs of the Old Religion," Gwydion Pendderwyn, 1975
Subject: Goddess

[Glenn Turner wrote in Vol. 6, Issue 3 of "The Witches' Trine" - Spring Equinox 1996:
"After a glorious sabbat in the summer of '69, our group of thirty or so 
was picnicking on the lawn at my parents' home in Mill Valley. At the foot of
the lawn is a redwood grove with a circular daughter-ring at its heart. 
There, in the shaded center, we had raised a strong cone-of-power as we
danced to the music of "Nonesuch" played on a flute. 

Everyone felt that "Nonesuch", though it lacked words, held the right 
rhythm and tone. "How very good it would be to sing as we dance," I said, as
we rested there on the grass, and the others agreed. After that, the 
thought stayed with me. 

My mother, Hope Athearn, is a published poet, so the next time I went to 
Mill Valley I asked her if she would write lyrics for "Nonesuch". She was
delighted. She agreed at once. But there was a problem. My mother is not a 
musician; in fact she can't carry a tune at all.

The upshot of that was an odd afternoon with me singing the tune to a 
series of da-da-das and beating the rhythm out with my hands. Meanwhile
my mother made poetic notations of long and short beats on a paper pad 
to discover the scansion required for the words. I think she already
knew it would be a paean to nature. The next week she gave me the words. 
And here they are, just as she wrote them."]

Oh, She will bring the buds in the spring
and dance among the flowers.
In summer's heat Her kisses are sweet,
She sings in leafy bowers.
She cuts the cane, She gathers the grain,
when fruits of fall surround Her.
Her bones grow old in wintery cold,
She wraps Her cloak around Her.

But She will bring the buds in the spring
etc. etc. (repeat)

(The Lady's Bransle (pronounced 'brawl') is the song that most frequently 
accompanies the cone of power dance at NROOGD rituals.)