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The Annotated Edition

DEAD MAN'S MORRICE by Alfred Noyes

Summary, meaning, line-by-line analysis & FAQ.

A mysterious fiddler at a tavern plays a tune that the speaker can’t seem to forget, and the poem expands from that haunting melody into reflections on love, death, and the anxiety of being forgotten.

Poet
Alfred Noyes
Year
1907
The PoemFull text

DEAD MAN'S MORRICE

Alfred Noyes, 1907

There came a crowder to the Mermaid Inn, One dark May night, Fiddling a tune that quelled our motley din, With quaint delight, It haunts me yet, as old lost airs will do, A phantom strain: _Look for me once, lest I should look for you, And look in vain._ In that old wood, where ghosts of lovers walk, At fall of day, Gleaning such fragments of their ancient talk As poor ghosts may, From leaves that brushed their faces, wet with dew, Or tears, or rain,... _Look for me once, lest I should look for you, And look in vain._ Have we not seen them--pale forgotten shades That do return, Groping for those dim paths, those fragrant glades, Those nooks of fern, Only to find that, of the may they knew, No wraiths remain; _Yet they still look, as I should look for you, And look in vain._ They see those happier ghosts that waned away-- Whither, who knows?-- Ghosts that come back with music and the may, And Spring's first rose, Lover and lass, to sing the old burden through, Stave and refrain: _Look for me once, lest I should look for you, And look in vain._ So, after death, if in that starless deep, I lose your eyes, I'll haunt familiar places. I'll not keep Tryst in the skies. I'll haunt the whispering elms that found us true, The old grass-grown lane. _Look for me there, lest I should look for you, And look in vain._ There, as of old, under the dreaming moon, A phantom throng Floats through the fern, to a ghostly morrice tune, A thin sweet song, Hands link with hands, eyes drown in eyes anew, Lips meet again.... _Look for me, once, lest I should look for you, And look in vain._

Public domain

Sourced from Project Gutenberg

§01Quick summary

What this poem is about

A mysterious fiddler at a tavern plays a tune that the speaker can’t seem to forget, and the poem expands from that haunting melody into reflections on love, death, and the anxiety of being forgotten. The speaker envisions that after death, rather than resting in heaven, they will return to haunt the earthly places where love thrived — the elm trees, the familiar lane, the moonlit woods. Ultimately, the poem serves as a heartfelt plea to a beloved: search for me, or I’ll wander for eternity looking for you and never succeed.

§02Themes

Recurring themes

§03Line by line

Stanza by stanza, with notes

  1. There came a crowder to the Mermaid Inn, / One dark May night,

    Editor's note

    A crowder is an old term for a fiddle player. He enters the Mermaid Inn — a genuine London tavern known since Elizabethan times — on a dark May night and quiets the raucous crowd with his music. The setting feels intentionally old-fashioned, drawing us into a realm where the line between the living and the dead seems blurred. The refrain he plays — *Look for me once, lest I should look for you, and look in vain* — is presented here as a 'phantom strain,' a tune that sticks in the mind like a ghost.

  2. In that old wood, where ghosts of lovers walk, / At fall of day,

    Editor's note

    The scene transitions from the inn to a twilight forest filled with the spirits of past lovers. These apparitions drift among damp leaves and dew, attempting to capture fragments of conversations they once shared. The description of leaves 'wet with dew, or tears, or rain' intentionally blurs the line between nature and emotion — it’s hard to tell if the moisture comes from the weather or from sorrow. The refrain echoes again, now sounding less like a song and more like a warning.

  3. Have we not seen them--pale forgotten shades / That do return,

    Editor's note

    Noyes shifts to 'we,' inviting the reader to witness the poem alongside him. These ghosts return to the woods they cherished in life, searching for the hawthorn blossoms ('the may') and the fern-filled glades — but they find nothing of what they once knew. The landscape has moved on without them. The line 'of the may they knew, no wraiths remain' is quietly heartbreaking: even the memory of the place has faded, leaving the ghosts with nothing to hold onto.

  4. They see those happier ghosts that waned away-- / Whither, who knows?--

    Editor's note

    Now there are two kinds of ghosts: the lost and lonely ones wandering through an altered landscape, and a second, happier kind who return with music and spring flowers, still accompanied by their lovers. These joyful spirits sing the refrain together—it transforms into a love song instead of a lament when two people share it. The contrast is striking: the difference between a haunting and a reunion is whether someone is waiting for you.

  5. So, after death, if in that starless deep, / I lose your eyes,

    Editor's note

    This is the emotional core of the poem. The speaker makes a heartfelt promise: if death pulls them apart from their beloved, they won’t wait for any celestial meeting in the afterlife. Instead, they will return to the exact earthly locations — the elm trees, the old grass-grown lane — where their love was genuine and authentic. The refrain changes a bit here: 'Look for me *there*,' providing a specific place for their longing. It's a deeply physical kind of love, one that resists the idea of abstraction.

  6. There, as of old, under the dreaming moon, / A phantom throng

    Editor's note

    The poem ends with a vision of the 'ghostly morrice' — a morris dance danced by the dead. Hands join, eyes connect, lips touch once more. The morrice (an archaic spelling of morris) is a communal folk dance, suggesting a revival of love among an entire community of reunited lovers. The final refrain omits the word 'there' and closely mirrors the opening lines, but now it carries the weight of everything the poem has developed: it transforms from merely a fiddler's tune into the speaker's own timeless longing.

§04Tone & mood

How this poem feels

The tone is both tender and quietly urgent, carrying a folk-ballad simplicity that prevents the grief from becoming overly dramatic. Noyes maintains a minor key throughout, and while there's a sense of melancholy in every stanza, the prevailing emotion is one of longing rather than despair. The use of archaic words (like crowder, morrice, may, wraiths) lends the poem a timeless, almost dreamlike feel, as if it were a song that echoes from another century. The refrain acts like a musical hook; each repetition adds emotional depth without altering the words significantly, similar to how a chorus resonates more by the end of a song than it does at the beginning.

§05Symbols & metaphors

Symbols & metaphors

The fiddler's tune / refrain
The repeated line — *Look for me once, lest I should look for you, and look in vain* — serves as the emotional backbone of the poem. It begins as a melody from a stranger and transforms into the speaker's personal promise. Here, music symbolizes the enduring nature of emotion through time and even beyond death: a tune that 'haunts' perfectly captures something that lingers.
The may (hawthorn blossom)
May blossom represents spring, renewal, and young love in English tradition. In the poem, the ghosts look for 'the may they knew' but find nothing — the flowers are absent, along with the world that once held their love. When the happier ghosts come back *with* the may, it shows that their love has endured.
The wood at fall of day
The twilight wood serves as the poem's liminal space—caught between day and night, and between the living and the dead. It's a place where ghosts feel most comfortable, and where love, memory, and loss intertwine. Noyes uses this setting to imply that the line between life and death is more fragile than we realize, particularly when strong emotions are at play.
The ghostly morrice (morris dance)
The morris dance is a lively communal folk tradition from England, rich in energy and intricate patterns. As a 'dead man's morrice,' it evolves into a dance of reunion — where the dead return to the rhythms of life and love. This adds a sense of joyful, albeit ghostly, continuity to the poem's ending instead of a feeling of final loss.
The elms and the old lane
These specific places—the whispering elms and the grass-covered lane—represent the uniqueness of true love. The speaker rejects a vague idea of a heavenly afterlife and insists on coming back to *these* trees and *this* path. The detail matters: love isn’t an abstract concept, and grief isn’t either.
The starless deep
Death is portrayed not as heaven or hell but as a 'starless deep' — a place devoid of light, direction, or any recognizable features. It represents the final state of being lost. The speaker's fear isn't death itself, but rather the thought of losing sight of their beloved's eyes in that darkness. This is why they choose to return to the bright, familiar world instead.

§06Historical context

Historical context

Alfred Noyes wrote during the late Victorian and Edwardian era, a time when English poetry was still enchanted by folk traditions, medieval imagery, and the ballad form. His most famous poem, 'The Highwayman' (1906), reflects a similar passion for moonlit drama and romantic fatalism. 'Dead Man's Morrice' taps into two specific traditions: the morris dance, an English folk performance that dates back to at least the fifteenth century, and the ghost-lover ballad, a genre that includes works like 'The Unquiet Grave' and Keats's 'La Belle Dame sans Merci.' The Mermaid Inn was a real tavern in Cheapside, linked to Shakespeare, Marlowe, and Jonson, so mentioning it connects the poem to a rich heritage of English literary ghosts. Noyes was writing at a time when industrialization was wiping away the rural England these traditions originated from, adding a deeper historical significance to the poem's sense of nostalgia.

§07FAQ

Questions readers ask

A morrice (or morris) is a traditional English folk dance. The term refers to a morris dance performed by the dead—which is precisely what the final stanza depicts, with ghosts dancing in the moonlit wood. This introduces the poem's main theme: the idea that the dead don’t just vanish; they come back to the dances, the places, and the loves they cherished in life.

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