A hundred years from now
on the brink of a new era
you would still find fragments
of the old world’s legends and songs
in desolate regions on the Danish heath.
As dusk came
and afterthoughts crept
from the darkness
into the simple houses
scattered across the heather landscape
the humble residents
would gather in the scant light
wool-knitting
while quietly singing the tales
of evil fate and tender love
they themselves had heard
sung in the same twilight
by the generations before
From his simple clerk house in Gjellerup
folklorist Evald Tang Kristensen
went on solitary journeys on foot
along wet ruts through the heather
hunting ballads
in sparse light
he collected what he heard
in the humble homes
hoping that songs and tales
could be kept alive o