Who Am I That Shine So Bright Lyrics
Someone with a pretty yellow light peeps through the curtains, rises when the sun has gone and rides among the stars like a queen. The speaker lights the harvest fields too, and the last line gives the answer: the moon.
Who Am I That Shine So Bright
Who am I that shine so bright,
With my pretty yellow light;
Peeping through your curtains grey?
Tell me, little girl, I pray.
When the sun is gone, I rise
In the very silent skies;
And a cloud or two doth skim
Round about my silver rim.
All the little stars do seem
Hidden by my brighter beam;
And among them I do ride,
Like a queen in all her pride.
Then the reaper goes along,
Singing forth a merry song,
While I light the shaking leaves,
And the yellow harvest sheaves.
Little girl, consider well,
Who this simple tale doth tell;
And I think you'll guess it soon,
For I only am the moon.
Printed from https://nurseryrhymes.co/who-am-i-that-shine-so-bright/
- Type
- Poems for Children
- Tune
- Soft and slow, like a night sky, with a smile on the last line
- Best for ages
- 4 to 8 years
Hand Motions and Actions
| When you sing | Do this |
|---|---|
| When the sun is gone, I rise | Start crouched low with your hands together, then rise slowly onto tiptoe. |
| Peeping through your curtains grey | Hold your hands up like two curtains and peek between them. |
What Does Who Am I That Shine So Bright Mean?
The moon gives itself away only at the end. Before that, the clues are all about night: a "pretty yellow light" that peeps "through your curtains grey", a rise that only starts "when the sun is gone", "a cloud or two" skimming round a "silver rim", and a beam so bright that the little stars "seem hidden". Riding among them "like a queen in all her pride" is the poem's picture of the moon in the middle of a starry sky.
The fourth verse brings in the harvest. The reaper is a worker cutting the ripe grain, who goes along singing while the moon lights "the shaking leaves" and the sheaves, the tied bundles of cut corn. The last four lines turn to the reader, "little girl", and say the moon will be guessed soon, for "I only am the moon."
History and Origin
The poem is from Rhymes for the Nursery, by the "Authors of Original Poems", in the twenty-third edition printed in London in 1831 for Harvey and Darton. Its title there is "A pretty Thing", and it answers the sun riddle in the same book, Who Am I with Noble Face.
Learning Activities
- Moon watch: look out of a window on a clear evening and find where the moon is, and whether it is round, half or thin.
- Curtain peek: open a curtain a little and let the moon, or a lamp, peep through, then say the first verse.
- Sun or moon? read out clues from both riddles and ask the child which one each belongs to.
- Draw the night: paint a yellow moon with a silver rim and stars around it.