Seven Times One (The Song of Seven)

DESCRIPTION: "There’s no dew left on the daisies and clover, There’s no rain left in heaven; I’ve said my 'seven times' over and over, Seven times one are seven. I am old, I am old, I can write a letter...." The writer proceeds through life: seven times two, etc.
AUTHOR: Jean Ingelow (1820-1897) (source: Ingelow's _Poems_)
EARLIEST DATE: 1880 (Ingelow's _Poem_; see NOTES)
KEYWORDS: children age family sheep
FOUND IN: Ireland
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Kane-SongsAndSayingsOfAnUlsterChildhood, pp. 60-61, "There's no dew left on the daisies and clover" (1 text)
ADDITIONAL: Jean Ingelow, _The Poetical Works of Jean Ingelow_ (sometimes published, or referred to, as _Poems_), T. Y. Crowell & Co., c. 1875 (the dedication is dated 1863), p. 126, "The Song of Seven" (1 text)
Roud #25493
CROSS-REFERENCES:
cf. "The Ages of Man" (theme)
NOTES [189 words]: Jean Ingelow's "Seven Times..." poem proceeds through life: Seven times one is a seven-year-old child just learning to read and write, a section called "Exultation." Seven times two is "Romance," then "Love," "Maternity," "Widowhood," "Giving in Marriage," "Longing for Home," each one seven years after the last.
It is one of only two Ingelow poems that is remembered at all, the other being "High Tide on the Coast of Lancashire," which I personally didn't like nearly as well. This one I like, even though it proceeds through life too quickly. It is ironic that Ingelow lived half again as long as the woman in the poem -- and never married, so she never experienced most of the life phases in this song. She wrote a poem about missing a sailor lost at sea -- just possibly Francis Crozier, the second-in-command to John Franklin in Franklin's Northwest Passage expedition (see the notes to "Lady Franklin's Lament (The Sailor's Dream)" [Laws K9] for more about that).
In addition to her poems, Ingelow wrote the fairly well-known tale of "Mopsa the Fairy." But there is no hint of any of her other work going into tradition. - RBW
Last updated in version 6.5
File: KSUC060C

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