> Folk Music > Songs > Hope Is Before Us

Hope Is Before Us

[ Roud - ; William Morris / Hazel Askew]

Lady Maisery and Jimmy Aldridge & Sid Goldsmith sang Hope Is Before Us on their 2019 Winter album Awake, Arise. They noted:

Throughout William Morris’s writing, seasonal imagery in inextricably linked with his messages of unity, hope and the struggle for a better future. His ideas feel searingly relevant for today.

Hazel [Askew] rewrote and added to the original words of William Morris. From his collection of Chants for Socialists, 1885. Tune by Hazel Askew.

Lyrics

Lady Maisery and Jimmy Aldridge & Sid Goldsmith sing Hope Is Before Us

I heard some saying, leave hope and praying
All days shall be as all have been
Today, tomorrow, bring fear and sorrow
And never ending woe between

But the hope we lost begins to glimmer
Like Autumn wheat under snow lies green
The moon that shines through clouds and darkness
The babe inside that grows unseen

Chorus (after every other verse, twice at the end):
Come shoulder to shoulder, for the world grows older
Help lies in none but you and I
Hope is before us, so let our chorus
Bring joy at last to all our lives

When the earth was younger, mid toil and hunger
In hope we strove, our hands were strong
Then great men led us, with words they fed us
And made us sing a different song

But now the seeds of spring are sown
Let wintered hearts be warmed by sun
The joy of people now buds and grows
The birds will sing ere the winter’s done

We know not who’ll lead us, what god shall heed us
But now we’ve seen what our hands have won
The world’s been shaken and fear awakened
But let good faith not be undone

We have voice and vision from those before us
The famed and honoured, the nameless wise
While many living, their lives are giving
To help a bright new world arise

Now to the tavern, the lights and fire
The fiddler’s tune, under shuffling feet
For in the morning a new day’s dawning
The young abounding year we’ll meet