Love Has Brought Me- Berzilla Wallin (NC) 1963 REC
[From the Album Old Love Songs & Ballads from the Big Laurel, North Carolina, 1964. Berzilla's "Love has Brought Me to Despair" which she sang when she was in her 70s:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ey6_HnqnodU
Berzilla Chandler Wallin (1892- 1986) was a member of a family of renowned "Shelton Laurel" ballad singers in Madison County, North Carolina. Berzilla, who was there when Sharp collected ballads in 1916, was the sister of ballad singers Lloyd Chandler and Dellie Chandler Norton, and a cousin of Dillard Chandler.
R. Matteson 2017]
LOVE HAS BROUGHT ME TO DESPAIR -sung by Berzilla Wallin c.1963, my transcription.
My father he was a rich old jay
My mother she was a lady fair
And me a-bein' the only heir
So love has brought me to despair.
It's when I wore my long silk gown
He follered me from town to town
But now my apron just won't tie
He passes my door and he won't stop in.
There is a street in yonders town
Where my true love walks up and down
He takes another girl on his knee,
And tells to her what he won't tell me,
He takes another girl on his knee,
Oh ain't awful grief to me.
There is some flowers I've heard them say,
That' would cure false love both night and day
And of these flowers I did pull,
Until I got my apron full.
I gathered black, I gathered blue,
But none of these flowers could I find;
That would cure false love
Or ease my mind.
It's out of these leaves I made a bed
And out of the flowers a pillow for my head
It's down she lay and nary word spoke,
Until her achin' heart was broke,
And in green meadows 'round
I thought I heard some doleful sound.