Another last-day-of-the-month posting of my monthly song! This means my summer is keeping me busy with lots of fun and very little time home alone to write or record. But I got the song written last week and recorded today in some snatched moments.

You might recognize some of the influences in this song. One, repeated smoky days here in Minnesota from Canadian wildfires. On one of these days I was struck with how I could actually stare at the orange sun through the smoke with no ill effects on my eyes – and that’s a second influence – that U2 song. Three, the flooding in New England and specifically the destruction to downtown Montpelier, Vermont – we had just visited a friend there last summer, beautiful little city – and this summer, in my friend’s words, the town is totaled. Four, my love of gardening, one of the things I’ve been happily busy with this summer.

Even if this is all there ever is
I’m happy to be here now
This present moment so generous
And a big bright world all around

Stay alive with me
Take your time to breathe
Think your big ideas
Then toss them out like seeds and see what they become

Storms raging and the floods rise higher
We’re afraid of what’s to come
World burning and the smoke spreads wider
Now we can all stare at the sun

Stay alive with me
Take your time to breathe
Think your big ideas
Then toss them out like seeds and see what they become

Heart and hand and soul and skin are we
Dust of stars beyond our reach
Flowers of the field, dry dancing bones
Broken brilliant wondrous ones

Day keeps dawning and the night grows darker
We wake and sleep and dream and live
Memories soften and hope grows harder
We never know it like it is

Stay alive with me
Take your time to breathe
Think your big ideas
Then toss them out like seeds and see what they become