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. 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 love easy, as the leaves grow on the tree But I, being young and foolish, with her would not agree. Poem Down by the salley gardens my love and I did meet She passed the salley gardens with little snow-white feet. It first appeared under its present title when it was reprinted in Poems in 1895. Yeats's original title, 'An Old Song Re-Sung', reflected his debt to The Rambling Boys of Pleasure. The rest of the song, however, is quite different. The similarity to the first verse of the Yeats version is unmistakable and would suggest that this was indeed the song Yeats remembered the old woman singing. But I being young and foolish, with my darling did not agree.' I took her in my arms and to her I gave kisses sweet She bade me take life easy just as the leaves fall from the tree. 'Down by yon flowery garden my love and I we first did meet.

Yeats indicated in a note that it 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 sings them to herself.' The 'old song' may have been the ballad The Rambling Boys of Pleasure which contains the following verse:

Salley gardens britten pdf