Morning came again anyway
Headache
Buttons pressed
The making and unmaking
Without end
Fill the cup
Empty the cup
Tidy
Mess it all up
Repeat
Repeat
Repeat
Until the song stops hurting
And the aroma becomes pleasant
And each breath welcome again
Drink deeply then
Of life
~ Freshly Brewed Excerpt by Wendy Kheiry
Weather stripping around the front door
Slippers without holes
Huge
Difference
All the difference
I would tell you over and again
What I love about you
How the sparkle in your eyes lights up the world
How your big huge heart inspires me
How your dedication to the ones you love earns my respect
I would tell you once again
How your love for nature resonates through the wild woods
How your ability to overcome adversity with patience and hope brightens dark corners
How your insights and devotion to growth blaze trails in the minds around you
I would tell you once more
How your presence in this world is needed
How without you the world would be smaller, darker, colder
How without you the music would never play
The sun itself would dull
The clouds would never lift
And song itself would end
These are some of the ways I love you
How can I thank you for the joy you bring
For the light that shines through you
For the notes that become the melody
The harmony of this dissonant world
How can I thank you for staying
Who will tell you these things when I am gone
Listen to the whisper of the wind at dawn
To the ocean coming to shore
To the birds singing in the trees
Saying, “Thank you. I love you. I see you, magnificent.”
I wrote this song thinking of the line from Gotye’s Somebody That I Used to Know that goes “You can get addicted to a certain kind of sadness,” and how even so, we seek out love and connection with others.
“Like resignation to the end, always the end”
Gotye’s song is, of course, beautiful and sad, and poignant, about endings and final words to lovers beyond our reach.
As Rosalie once said of Bottle of the Blues, “This is a kind of mood.”
Perhaps the addiction is to a darker shade of sadness, one with brittle cracks, and jagged edges.
It’s about beginnings, and connection even in the midst of pain and suffering.
This is a kind of mood, and not everyone will understand.
For those who do, I’m sorry.
Lyrics here
This is part of my systematic effort to reduce performance anxiety, and share original music. I’ve played this song only for a handful of people prior to recording.
There are other new posts up on my YouTube Channel, some of which are mildly amusing, sporadically informative, randomly entertaining, and insightful as to why something that might take 15 minutes will digress into singing, extemporaneous playing, and exploring the nature of sound.
This video stays on track though (miraculously).
Hold that first note
Long and low
Walk down the scale in time
Those minor keys
Unlock me
Sing the cage door open
With harmonies I fly
In melody return
Lift up a voice that’s true
Sing me back together
Climb again the mountain
Sail upon the sea
Lose me in the forest
Rhymes and rhythm captured
Spirits freed enraptured
Loose me from this prison
Sing me pure and good
Sing me real and gritty
Sing me one more time
Sing me back to you
There are flowers out her window
The birds, they come to play
The swingers and the bluejays
Come for a bite, but never stay
There’s something to remember
But the thoughts begin to slip away
There are anchors getting lighter
Which hold the world in place
There’s something to remember
Getting fewer every day
At first she doesn’t know me
Uncertain and confused
Then a spark begins to flicker
In her eyes
“You’re the girl who plays guitar”
We pluck the strings
I try to sing
Her face begins to shine
Stories that she tells
Of a long and busy life
And it’s fitting that there’s people
Who come to care for her
After everything she’s done
For those she loves
Each time I think she’s fallen
Into a deeper sleep
I stop playing for a moment
And she stirs
“More music?”
And she tells me not to sneak away
Play another song for me
My audience of one
She might forget the songs I’ve sung
And that’s all right with me
For just some moments she is shining
Like a flower in the sun
Every song is new
Every song is new
Across the savannah of time
Waving grasses
Isolated trees
So much sky
There are herds roaming
From watering hole
To watering hole
There is the pride that lounges
Rising to stalk when hungry
Sun rises and sets and rises again
Stars move through their patterns in the night
At dusk and dawn
The melody of sunlight
The rhythm of constellations
Eons in minutes
The story told of all that life is
In the eyes of a lion
In the eyes of the antelope
In the flight of birds
And the whisper of grass moved
To dance by the wind
Across the savannah of time
Populations rise and set and rise
Inexorable setting sun
Imperative rising dawn
We sing to mourn the fall of light
We sing to celebrate illumination
We sing life awake
We sing death to sleep
We sing because we cannot stop
We sing in every movement
This song of existence
In every breath
Sung
The eyes of a lion
Looking out across the savannah
No time eternal
Forever fleeting
They hang like chimes
Those hearts dangling over earth and stone
To hear their song in the hushed morning mist
Singing tales of brokenness and healing
Is to wander wonderingly into a pinpoint light
Soft and warm against the cool, hard texture
Of stone
Is to remember being wrapped in your arms
In a way that hasn’t happened yet
In a way that may never happen
Except in the floral chimes
Suspended
Protected
Swaying beautifully
Lit from within
Let us soften love
And meet one day on the path
Through fog and forest
Let us soften love
Until the light of us
Becomes one
As the stone blossoms
And hearts softly sing
