John Musto’s training as a jazz and classical pianist has allowed a

healthy duality to grow throughout his compositional career. Recuerdo

(Memory), a cycle offour songs written for William Sharp and Steven Blier

in 1987, includes the elegiac “A Last Song,” which the composer dedicated to

the memory of his friend Jeffery French, as well as “Recuerdo,” an impression of Edna Saint Vincent Millay’s jazz-age New York. “Nothing Gold Can 

Stay” and “The Rose Family” comprise Musto’s 1986 mini-cycle Two by Frost.

As the title implies, it consists of briefsettings ofshort Robert Frost poems.

Born in 1954 in Brooklyn, Musto studied at the Manhattan School ofMusic.

In 2007 the National Gallery ofArt and the Opera Studio at the University of

Maryland commissioned Musto to write an opera in honor ofthe exhibition 

Edward Hopper. The result was Later the Same Evening, an Opera Inspired by Five

Paintings ofEdward Hopper, which received its world premiere performances at

the university and the National Gallery in December 2007.

An author and composer with a unique and powerful voice, Paul Bowles

left the University ofVirginia after one semester for Paris, where he took up

study with Nadia Boulanger and her pupils Aaron Copland and Virgil Thomson. In the early 1930s he befriended Gertrude Stein, who preferred Bowles’

middle name to his first, calling him “Freddy.” Two ofher letters to Bowles

bookend the final set on tonight’s program. The straightforward “Letter to

Freddy” sharply contrasts Stein’s typically eccentric writing style as revealed in

“April Fool Baby.” “Secret Words” and “Sleeping Song” are more personal texts,

written by Bowles himself and set as stand-alone art songs. “A Little Closer,

Please” sends a simple message accompanied by a lively march. The two songs 

from Tennessee Williams’ In the Winter ofCities evoke particular images with 

simple musical devices—a fellow in a rocking chair with a country drawl 

accompanied by ragtime music in “Lonesome Man,” and a taciturn reflection 

on three past loves accompanied by childishly simple music in “Three.”

Program notes by Michael Jacko, concert aide, National Gallery ofArt

The Seventieth Season of

The William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin

Concerts

National Gallery ofArt

2,896th Concert

Rosa Lamoreaux, soprano

William Sharp, baritone

Maribeth Gowen, pianist

June 10, 2012 

Sunday, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court

Admissionfree
Program

“Barber and Friends”

Samuel Barber (1910-1981)

Hermit Songs, op. 29 (1953)

At Saint Patrick’s Purgatory

Church Bell at Night

Saint Ita’s Vision

The Heavenly Banquet

The Crucifixion

Sea Snatch

Promiscuity

The Monk and His Cat

The Praises of God

The Desire for Hermitage

Virgil Thomson (1896-1989)

Two by Marianne Moore

English Usage

My Crow Pluto

From Five Songs from William Blake

The Little Black Boy

Tiger Tiger

From Mostly about Love

Love Song

A Prayer to Saint Catherine

INTERMISSION

Barber

Three Songs, op. 45 (1972)

Now Have I Fed and Eaten Up the Rose

A Green Lowland of Pianos

O Boundless, Boundless Evening

John Musto (b. 1954)

A Last Song 

Nothing Gold Can Stay

The Rose Family 

Recuerdo

Paul Bowles (1910-1999)

Letter to Freddy 

Secret Words 

A Little Closer, Please

Lonesome Man

Sleeping Song 

Three

April Fool Baby
The Musicians

ROSA IAMOREAUX

Acclaimed for her “scrupulous musicianship...gorgeous sound and stylistic 

acuity” (Washington Post), Rosa Lamoreaux maintains an international

career of broad scope, including solo recitals, chamber music, opera, and

orchestral performances at Carnegie Hall, the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 

the Kennedy Center, Royal Albert Hall, Strathmore Hall, and the Washington National Cathedral, among other major concert venues. Highlights of

the current season include Debussy’s La Damoiselle due at the National

Gallery ofArt; Bach Cantatas and the B Minor Mass at the Phillips Collection, Bethlehem Bach Festival, and Washington National Cathedral; and

American musical revues for the Dumbarton Concert Series. Her concert

tours abroad have included performances in Italy, Germany, the United

Kingdom, Brazil, Peru, and Japan. Highly praised as a Bach soloist, Lamoreaux is featured regularly at the Bethlehem and Carmel Bach Festivals, and

she is a frequent soloist with the Cathedral Choral Society, Choral Arts of

Washington, the National Philharmonic Chorale, and the Washington Bach

Consort. Her orchestral credits include the Atlanta, Cincinnati, and Dallas 

Symphony Orchestras. Greatly in demand as a chamber music performer,

she sings with ArcoVoce, Chatham Baroque, the Folger Consort, Four

Nations Ensemble, Hesperus, Musica Aperta, and Opera Lafayette.

Now in her eighth season as artistic director ofthe National Gallery ofArt

Vocal Ensemble, Rosa Lamoreaux’s museum performance venues also include

the Cloisters, the Corcoran Gallery, the Louvre, the Metropolitan Museum

ofArt, the Phillips Collection, and the Smithsonian Institution. She recently 

received her seventh Washington Area Music Association wammie award as

Best Classical Vocalist. With numerous recordings ofmusic from Hildegard

von Bingen to Stephen Paulus to her credit as well as broadcast concerts on 

pbs, bbc, and cbc, she maintains a website at mvw.rosasings.com.

WILLIAM SHARP

Much in demand as an opera soloist, recitalist, and recording artist, baritone

William Sharp has enjoyed an extremely busy 2011-2012 season, which

included major roles in two operatic premieres— The Inspector by John

Musto and Le Roi et le Fermier by Pierre-Alexandre Monsigny. Sharp also 

sang the world premiere of David Froom’s Amichai Songs in their orchestral

version at River Concerts in Saint Mary’s City, Maryland; Charles Villiers

Stanford’s orchestral song cycle The Songs ofthe Fleet with the Chorus of

Westerly and the Boston Festival Orchestra; six performances of Mahler’s

Kindertotenlieder; and four performances ofCopland’s Old American Songs

with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra under Marin Alsop. Locally, he

sang music ofCharles Ives with the Post Classical Ensemble and portrayed

Ebenezer Scrooge in Jon Dealc’s The Passion ofScrooge with the 21st-Century

Consort at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Also active in the recording studio, he completed his second recordings ofboth Johann Sebastian

Bach’s Passions according to Saint Matthew and Saint John as well as

Schumann’s Dichterliehe and Liederkreis, op. 39.

William Sharp made his song recital debut in New York in 1983 at the

92nd Street Y and sang to a standing-room-only audience in Carnegie Hall 

later that year. Winner ofthe 1987 Carnegie Hall International American

Music Competition, he was nominated for the 1989 Grammy award for 

Best Classical Vocal Performance for his recording ofsongs by American

composers. He is featured on the 1990 Grammy award-winning world

premiere recording of Leonard Bernstein’s Arias and Barcarolles.

5
MARIBETH GOWEN

A prize-winning soloist and chamber musician who frequently collaborates 

with vocalists, Maribeth Gowen has made concerto appearances with the

Alabama, Baltimore, Chattanooga, and Tucson Symphony Orchestras as well

as the National Chamber Orchestra and the National Gallery ofArt Orchestra.

She has performed in many ofthe nation’s premiere concert venues, including the National Gallery, the Phillips Collection, and Weill Hall at Carnegie

Hall in New York. Outside the United States, she has been heard in Meunster,

Germany and Istanbul and Izmir, Turkey as well as at the International

Bellapais Music Festival in North Cyprus. Ms. Gowen’s teachers and coaches 

have included Nelita True, Menahem Pressler, and the members ofthe

Guarneri Quartet.

6

Program Notes

Aided by his early childhood vocal studies, Samuel Barber grew into a

versatile composer gifted in writing for the voice. His relationship with his

aunt and uncle, Louise and Sidney Homer, a contralto at the Metropolitan

Opera and an art song composer respectively, contributed to his constant

contact with and enjoyment ofthe art song genre.

The Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation commissioned Hermit Songs,

and engaged Leontyne Price to sing the premiere at the Library ofCongress

on October 30,1953, with Barber as her accompanist. The song texts originate

from anonymous writings by Irish monks between the eighth and thirteenth

centuries, embodying a wide array of characters from pious to obscene and

frivolous to deeply philosophical.

Barber completed Three Songs, op. 45, in 1972 during a period of personal upheaval. His third opera, Antony and Cleopatra, had failed at the

Metropolitan Opera in 1966; he and his partner, Gian Carlo Menotti, had

sold their beloved Westchester home; and he had been suffering from

alcoholism and depression throughout the 1960s. Gottfried Keller’s poem

“Now Have I fed and Eaten Up the Rose” is part of a cycle concerning a man

who has been buried alive. Though the theme is disturbing, terror is absent

from James Joyce’s translated excerpt and Barber’s setting, which depicts a

character with no place to go. “A Green Lowland of Pianos” is gentle and

filled with quirky surprises, and “O Boundless, Boundless Evening” is a

nostalgic tune saturated with a sense of desolation.

While a student at Harvard, Kansas City native Virgil Thomson visited

Paris while on tour with the Harvard Glee Club. Upon finishing his Harvard

degree in 1924, he applied for and received a fellowship for study in Paris.

His love for the city led him to take up residence there, where he stayed

until 1940. He became a fixture of Paris in the 1920s and 1930s, studying

composition with Nadia Boulanger and developing relationships with Aaron

Copland, Ernest Hemingway, Pablo Picasso, Gertrude Stein, and Igor

Stravinsky, among other artists and musicians. A devotee ofthe music of

Satie, Thomson imbued his own music with simplicity and charm, and

developed considerable facility in writing for the voice.
SONG TEXTS

1

SONGS OF SAMUEL BARBER

THE HERMIT SONGS

I. At Saint Patrick’s Purgatory

Pity me on my pilgrimage to Loch Derg!

O King ofthe churches and the bells 

bewailing your sores and your wounds,

But not a tear can I squeeze from my eyes!

Not moisten an eye after so much sin!

Pity me, O King!

What shall I do with a heart that seeks

only its own ease?

O only begotten Son by whom all men were made,

who shunned not the death by three wounds, 

pity me on my pilgrimage to Loch Derg

and I with a heart not softer than a stone!

Anonymous Irish text, 13th century

II. Church Bell at Night

Sweet little bell, struck on a windy night,

I would liefer keep tryst with thee

Than be

With a light and foolish woman.

Anonymous Irish text, 12th century

III. St. Ita’s Vision

“I will take nothing from my Lord,” said she,

“unless He gives me His Son from Heaven 

In the form of a Baby that I may nurse Him.”

So that Christ came down to her

in the form of a Baby and then she said:

“Infant Jesus, at my breast,

Nothing in this world is true

Save, O tiny nursling, You.

Infant Jesus, at my breast,

By my heart every night,

You I nurse are not

A churl but were begot

On Mary the Jewess by Heaven’s Light,

Infant Jesus, at my breast, 

what King is there but You who could

Give everlasting Good? 

wherefor I give my food.

Sing to Him, maidens, sing your best!

There is none that has such right 

To your song as Heaven’s King

Who every night 

Is Infant Jesus at my breast."

Attributed to St. Ita, 8th century

IV. The Heavenly Banquet

I would like to have the men of Heaven 

in my own house;

with vats of good cheer laid out for them.

I would like to have the three Marys,

their fame is so great.

I would like people from every comer of Heaven.

I would like them to be cheerful in their drinking.

I would like to have Jesus sitting here among them.

I would like a great lake of beer for the King of Kings.

I would like to be watching Heaven’s family

Drinking it through all eternity.

Attributed to St. Brigid, 10th century

V. The Crucifixion

At the cry ofthe first bird

They began to cmcify Thee, O Swan!

Never shall lament cease because ofthat.

It was like the parting of day from night.

Ah, sore was the suffering borne

By the body of Mary’s Son,

But sorer still to Him was the grief

Which for His sake

Came upon His Mother.

From The Speckled Book, 12th century

VI. Sea-Snatch

It has broken us, it has crushed us, it has drowned us,

O King ofthe starbright Kingdom of Heaven;

the wind has consumed us, swallowed us,

as timber is devoured by crimson fire from Heaven.

It has broken us, it has crushed us, it has drowned us,

O King ofthe starbright Kingdom of Heaven!

Anonymous Irish text, 8th-9th century
2

VII. Promiscuity I do not know with whom Edan will sleep,

butI do know that fair Edan will not sleep alone.

Anonymous Irish text,9th century

VIII. The Monk and His Cat

Pangur, white Pangur,

How happy we are

Alone together,

Scholar and cat.

Each has his own work to do daily;

For you it is hunting, for me study.

Your shining eye watches the wall;

my feeble eye is fixed ona book.

You rejoice when your claws

Entrapa mouse;

I rejoice when my mind

Fathomsa problem.

Pleased with his own art,

Neither hinders the other;

Thus we live ever

Without tedium and envy.

Pangur, white Pangur,

How happy we are

Alone together,

Scholar and cat.

Anonymous Irish text,8th or9th century

X. The Desire for Hermitage

Ah! To be all alone ina little cell with nobody

near me;

beloved that pilgrimage before the last pilgrimage

to Death.

Singing the passing hours to cloudy Heaven;

feeding upon dry bread and water from the

cold spring.

That will be an end to evil whenI am alone

ina lovely little comer among tombs

far from the houses ofthe great.

Ah! to be all alone ina little cell,

to be alone, all alone:

AloneI came into the world,

aloneI shall go from it.

Anonymous Irish text,8th-9th century

IX. The Praises of God

How foolish the man

Who does not raise

His voice and praise

With joyful words,

As he alone can,

Heaven’s High King.

To Whom the light birds

With no soul but air,

All day, everywhere

Laudation sing.

Anonymous Irish text, 11th century

SONGS OF VIRGIL

THOMSON I've escaped, eh?

am still trapped

"corvo";

although

TWO by MARIANNE MOORE by these con dizioword diseases. nario

English Usage

Makea fuss No pauses, io parlo

and be tedious. the phrases ItalianoI'm annoyed? lack lyric this pseudo

Yes; am. force;

sound caprick-like

Esperanto

I avoid "adore" which, savio

and "bore"; Attic Afric

Alcaic

ucello,

am,I

say, by or freak

calico Greek.

you speak toomy vow and motto

the word (Not verse

(botto

e totto)

(bore), bored;

io giuro

of course)

I refuse I'm sure ofthis:

e questo

to use

credo:

"divine"

to mean

Nothing mundane is divine;

Nothing divine is mundane.

lucro e peso morto.

From "Avec Ardeur"

something

And so

pleasing:

My Crow Pluto

dear crow-

"terrific color" Of: gioiello

for some horror.

my crow

mioThough flat Pluto, I have to

myself, I'd say that

the true

let you go;

"Atlas" Plato,

a bel bosco

(pressed glass)

azzurrogeneroso,

looks best negro tuttuto

embossed.

green-blue

vagabondo,

I refuse rainbow, serafino

to use

Victor Hugo,

uvacceo.

"enchant", it is true Sunto,

"dement";

we know

oltremarino

even "fright­ that the crow verecondo

ful plight" Plato, addio.

(howeverjustified) "has wings" how

­

ever pigeon-toed

From Tell

or "frivol­

ous fool" intumed on grass. We do

(however suitable). (adagio)

Vivorosso
4

From FIVE SONGS FROM WILLIAM

BLAKE

The Little Black Boy

My mother bore me in the southern wild,

And I am black, but O, my soul is white!

White as an angel is the English child,

But I am black, as if bereaved of light.

My mother taught me underneath a tree,

And, sitting down before the heat of day,

She took me on her lap and kissed me,

And, pointing to the East, began to say:

"Look at the rising sun: there God does live,

And gives His light, and gives His heat away,

And flowers and trees and beasts and men receive 

Comfort in morning, joy in the noonday.

"And we are put on earth a little space,

That we may learn to bear the beams of love;

And these black bodies and this sunburnt face

Are but a cloud, and like a shady grove.

'For when our souls have learn'd the heat to bear,

The cloud will vanish; we shall hear His voice,

Saying, 'Come out from the grove, my love and care,

And round my golden tent like lambs rejoice."'

Thus did my mother say, and kissed me,

And thus I say to little English boy:

When 1 from black and he from white cloud free,

And round the tent of God like lambs we joy,

I'll shade him from the heat till he can bear

To lean in joy upon our Father's knee;

And then I'll stand and stroke his silver hair,

And be like him, and he will then love me.

From Songs ofInnocence

Tiger, Tiger

Tiger, Tiger, burning bright 

In the forests ofthe night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire? 

What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder and what art

Could twist the sinews ofthy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand and what dread feet?

What the hammer? What the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? What dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears

And water'd heaven with their tears,

Did He smile His work to see?

Did He who made the lamb make thee?

Tiger, Tiger, burning bright 

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

From Songs ofExperience

From MOSTLY ABOUT LOVE

Love Song

I love you as a sheriffsearches for a walnut 

That will solve a murder case unsolved for years 

Because the murderer left it in the snow

beside a window

Through which he saw her head, connecting with

Her shoulders by a neck, and laid a red

Roof in her heart. For this we live a thousand years;

For this we love, and we live because we love,

we are not

Inside a bottle, thank goodness! I love you as a

Kid searches for a goat; I am crazier than shirttails 

In the wind, when you're near, a wind that blows from

The big blue sea, so shiny, so deep and so unlike us;

I think I am bicycling across an Africa

of green and white fields

Always, to be near you, even in my heart 

When I'm awake, which swims, and also

I believe that you

Are trustworthy as the sidewalk which leads me to

The place where I again think of you, a new

Harmony ofthoughts! I love you as the sunlight 

leads the prow 

Of a ship which sails

From Hartford to Miami, and I love you

Best at dawn, when even before I am awake the sun

Receives me in the questions which you always pose.

Kenneth Koch

5

A Prayer to Saint Catherine

If I am to be preserved from heartache and shyness 

By Saint Catherine of Siena,

I am praying to her that she will hear my prayer

And treat me in every way with kindness.

I went to Siena to Saint Catherine's own church 

(It is impossible to deny this)

To pray to her to cure me of my heartache 

and shyness.

Which she can do, because she is a great saint.

Other saints would regard my prayer as foolish.

Saint Nicolas, for example.

He would chuckle, "God helps those who

help themselves,

Rouse yourself! Get out there and do something 

about it!"

Or Saint Joanna. She would say, "It is

not shyness

That bothers you. It is sin.

Pray to Catherine of Siena." But that is

what I have done.

And that is why I have come here to cure

my heartache.

Saint Catherine of Siena,

Ifthis song pleases you, then be good enough 

to answer the prayer it contains.

Make the person that sings this song less shy

than that person is,

And give that person some joy in that

person's heart.

Kenneth Koch

SONGS OF SAMUEL BARBER

THREE SONGS, OP. 45

Now Have I Fed and Eaten Up the Rose

Now have I fed and eaten up the rose

Which then she laid within my stiffcold hand.

That I should ever feed upon a rose

I never had believed in liveman's land.

A Green Lowland of Pianos

in the evening

as far as the eye can see

herds

of black pianos

up to their knees

in the mire

they listen to the frogs

they gurgle in water 

with chords ofrapture

they are entranced

by froggish, moonish spontaneity

after the vacation 

they cause scandals 

in a concert hall

during the artistic milking 

suddenly they lie down 

like cows

looking with indifference 

at the white flowers 

ofthe audience

at the gesticulating 

ofthe ushers

Czeslaw Milosz, from the Polish of

Jerzy Harasymowicz

O Boundless, Boundless Evening

O boundless, boundless evening. Soon the glow

Of long hills on the skyline will be gone,

Like clear dream country now, rich-hued by sun.

O boundless evening where the cornfields throw 

The scattered daylight back in an aureole.

Swallows high up are singing, very small.

On every meadow glitters their swift flight,

In woods ofrushes and where tall masts stand

In brilliant bays. Yet in ravines beyond 

Between the hills already nests the night.

Christopher Middleton, from the German

of Georg Heym

Only I wonder was it white or red

The flower that in the darkness my food has been.

Give us, and if Thou give, thy daily bread,

Deliver us from evil, Lord, Amen.

James Joyce, from the German of

Gottfried Keller
SONGS OF JOHN MUSTO

Last Song

Goodbye, goodbye!

There was so much to love, I could not love it all;

I could not love it enough.

Some things I overlooked, and some I could not find.

Let the crystal clasp them

When you drink your wine, in autumn.

Louise Bogan, from After the Persian

In memoriam Jeffery' French

Two By Frost

1. Nothing Gold Can Stay

Nature's first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leafs a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leafsubsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.

Robert Frost, from New Hampshire

2. The Rose Family

The rose is a rose,

And was always a rose.

But the theory now goes

That the apple's a rose,

And the pear is, and so's

The plum, I suppose.

The dear only knows 

What will next prove a rose.

You, of course, are a rose -

But were always a rose.

Robert Frost, from West-Running Brook

Recuerdo

We were very tired, we were very merry —

We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.

It was bare and bright, and smelled like a stable —

But we looked into the fire, we leaned across a table,

We lay on a hilltop underneath the moon;

And the whistles kept blowing, and the dawn 

came soon.

We were very tired, we were very merry —

We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry;

And you ate an apple, and I ate a pear,

From a dozen of each we had bought somewhere; 

And the sky went wan, and the wind came cold,

And the sun rose dripping a bucketful of gold.

We were very tired, we were very merry,

We had gone back and forth all night on the ferry.

We hailed "Good morrow, mother!" to a shawlcovered head,

And bought a morning paper, which neither of

us read;

And she wept, "God bless you!" for the apples and

the pears,

And we gave her all our money but our subway fares

Edna St. Vincent Millay

SONGS OF PAUL BOWLES

Letter to Freddy

My dear Freddy,

I did not answer sooner because being a little

troubled about you I wanted to see Harry first.

Now I have and as it seems that you are really

not well don't you think it would be best to

come to Paris where you can be looked after,

and then we all can decide what you ought to do.

You poor boy, it's bad to be all alone and I do

think that you had better come here, don't you?

Always, Gertrude Stein.

Secret Words

Far within your face I saw the night

And in the night I saw the stars

And then the stars became your eyes

Awaiting secret words from me

But that can never, never be

Because I know the night has sealed your heart.

Oh, sing a song of lands where we might 

have wandered, long, long ago.

Sing a song of days when the earth was younger 

Days we'll never know.

Far within the night I heard the sea,

And on the sea I heard the wind

And then the wind became your voice

Entreating secret words from me

But this shall never, never be.

The dark has sealed your heart 

Paul Bowles

7

A Little Closer, Please (The Pitchman's Song)

It's a small world if you are near.

But if you're far, it's large —

very large —

too large for me, and dark,

and lonely, and full of barking dogs;

great, great distances and brooding trees.

Step up just a little closer, please.

A little closer, please!

Don't stand so far away.

A deck of cards, a few poetic words 

and love is all that I have brought with me.

A little closer, please!

Don't leave me here alone.

The nine of clubs,

a few romantic songs and faith

is all that I have brought with me.

Step up!

Step up!

Just a little closer, a little closer, please!

William Saroyan, from Love's Old Sweet Song

Lonesome Man

My chair rock-rocks by the door all day

But nobody ever stops my way,

Nobody ever stops by my way.

My teef chaw-chaw on an old ham bone an'

I do the dishes all alone,

I do the dishes all by my lone.

My feet clop-clop on the hardwood floor 'cause

I won't buy love at the hardware store,

I don't want love from the mercantile store.

Now the clock tick-tocks by my single bed while 

the moon looks down at my sleepless head,

While the moon grins down at an ole fool's head.

Tennessee Williams, from In the Winter ofCities

Sleeping Song

Baby, baby, who's my love?

Who's gonna shut those eyes?

Who's the one that's always good?

Who never cries?

Baby, baby, don't wake up.

It's lovely where you are.

Mother'd/Daddy'd like to go with you

Ever so far.

Baby, baby, lying there,

You look mighty small.

Wonder ifthe Lord looked down,

He'd see you at all.

Paul Bowles

Three

One I kept

Two I lost

Three is shelter'd 

under frost.

One I tired of

Two still wanted.

Three the starry

meadows haunted.

One was faithful

Two was clever 

Three stayed in

my heart forever.

Tennessee Williams, from In the Winter ofCities

April Fool Baby

It seems to be a note to she the sweet sweetie 

But actually it's April Fool to tender she

My sweetie

She is all me my sweetie

April full of fool which is me for my sweetie

Dear April which made she to be

All to he

April Fool to his sweetie which is she

Tenderly excessively sweetly 

My April Fool baby

Gertrude Stein