Songs of Innocence

Piping down the valleys wild

Piping songs of pleasant glee

Pipe a song about a lamb

So he vanished from my sight and I plucked a hollow reed

I stained the water clear

O’er my angel-guarded bed [..] where on grass me thought I lay

Over a many tangled spray all heart broke I heard her say

I saw a glow-worm near who replied what wailing wight calls the watchman of the night

The desert wild become the garden mild

How can Lyca sleep when her mother weep […] if my mother sleep Lyca shall not weep

The Kingly lion stood and the virgin viewed

And her bosom lick and upon her neck

Starved in desert wild

A couching lion lay

Lyca Lies asleep

Nor fear the wolvish howl, Nor the lion’s growl

Little Lamb who made thee

Dost thou know who made thee

Gave thee clothing of the light, softest clothing of the bright

Little Lamb I tell thee he is called by thy name, he calls himself a lamb.

Little Lamb God bless thee

I happy am; joy is my name; sweet joy befall thee

Sweet joy i call thee, thou dost smile, i sing the while

Can I see another’s woe and not be in sorrow too

No,no never can it be, never never can it be

and can he who smiles on all(…) not sit beside their nest pouring pity in their breast

He doth give his joy to all, he becomes an infant small

Think not how thou canst weep a tear and thy maker is not near

Till our grief is fed and gone he doth sit by us and moan

Their innocent faces clean

The children walking two by two in red and blue and green

Till into the high dome of Paul’s they like the Thames waters flow

The hum of multitudes was there but multitudes of lambs

Thousands of little boys and girls raise their innocent hands

Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door

Scarcely cry, ‘weep weep weep weep’

Curled like a lamb’s back

Locked up in coffins of black

An angel who had a bright key and he opened the coffins and set them free

If he’d be a good boy he’d have God for his father

So if all do their duty they need not feel harm

Sweet dreams form a shade O’er my lovely infants head

Sweet smiles, mother’s smiles

Sweet moans, dovelike sighs

Heavenly face

The sky-lark sings with me

The little ones spend the day in sighing and dismay

How can the bird that is born for joy sit in a cage and sing

When the blasts of winter appear

My heart is at rest within my breast, and everything else is still

Come, come leave off play, and let us away till the morning appears in the skies

Besides, in the sky the little black birds fly, and the hills are all covered in sheep

The little ones leaped and shouted and laughed and all the hills echoed

The sun does arise

On the echoing green

They laugh at our play

Such were the joys

On the darkening green