I launched several songs this week but landed none. Determined to turn something in for week 40 of #songaweek2022, as I’ve been a bit more hit or miss this year but was currently on a four-week roll, I turned to my stockpile of public domain poems and found this tiny treasure. It’s not much but it’s “This Much and More”:
If my lover were a comet Hung in air, I would braid my leaping body In his hair.
Yea, if they buried him ten leagues Beneath the loam, My fingers they would learn to dig And I’d plunge home!
Everybody in my house has been sick the last week, but I still managed to get a song written. Turning in a quick and easy lo-fi laptop recording this week.
Nobody told you how to let the best ones go Nobody told you so how were you to know? There’s some things you can only learn the hard way
She looked so good until you saw the splinters in her eyes Well ain’t it awful but you just won’t compromise There’s some things you’ll just have to learn the hard way
Love has seen it all Love’s heard everything Love loves it all Love learned the hard way
Don’t try to count up all the ways you got it wrong All it amounts to is the will to carry on There’s some things you can only learn the hard way
So don’t you fear now, just take each breath for what it is And what it is is another unexpected gift There’s some things you’ll just have to learn the hard way
Love has seen it all Love’s heard everything Love loves it all Love learned the hard way
When I was a child, I discovered my baby book – a scrapbook that was sent home with my mother from the hospital, titled The Book of Baby Mine. Being a word nerd from a young age, I was struck by that grammar – “baby mine” – it felt incorrect to me. It should be “my baby” or “the baby of mine,” I thought. (I hadn’t encountered the song by the same name from Dumbo yet, which might be where that title came from.)
Now, years later, being a parent whose first baby recently moved out of the nest – “baby mine” makes a whole lot more sense that has nothing to do with grammar.
You were so sweet you were so bright You were so deer in my headlights I helped you out, gathered you in Held you gently against my skin
Baby mine I love you all the time Baby mine you’re always in my mind
You are my joy born from pain You’re the deep happiness I named You are the laughter kissing my tears My life restarted when you got here
Baby mine I love you all the time Baby mine you’re always in my mind
Sleep well darling wherever you are And know I’m close, though it feels far I’ll sing for you all night long These are the words, this is the song:
Baby mine I love you all the time Baby mine you’re always in my mind
At last, my #songaweek2022 group used a photo for a prompt instead of a word or phrase. This felt like a game-changer to me in terms of connecting with a prompt for inspiration. I think the photo was of the Great Wall of China, but I thought of a road, then of the song from The Hobbit that starts, “the road goes ever on and on. . . ” and I went from there.
I felt like deliberately slowing down in the writing and playing of this song, and so I did.
If you listen closely and/or with headphones you might be able to hear the crickets singing along outside the open window.
The road goes ever on And over it a song That if you hear will draw you near to where you never know where you might go
The day lies before you And with it much to do But there’s a song that draws you on To where you always know you’re going home
The ground carries your load The clouds catch evening’s glow They’re changing you, and changed by you Till everything will never be the same
Life continues to be a bit crazy around here as we moved our oldest to college last week and two of us go back to school here at home (middle school lunch lady and high school sophomore). I mean not here at *home* but in our hometown. I mean not actually our town but the next one over, which is only a few blocks away. But I digress.
All that to say I’m still not back to finishing a song every week. This one was started last week and wrapped up and roughly recorded this week. Not one of my favorites but it’s just good to write again!
Here on the water in the middle of the land You can hear the wind, it’s whispering through the wings of birds above you And here in the forest surrounded by the trees You can feel the pulse of all the being things around you Ooooh. . . . and that’s called home
Deep in the hollows of your heavy heart There is still a song reverberating in this moment Lapsing synapses at the back of your brain Keep trying all the ways they know to tell the story how it goes Ooooh . . . . and that’s called life
And you You will be well You will find wisdom in the way of wonder
Julia Bloom 