Follow the heron into the springtime

It's a chilly but beautiful sunny morning at Mundi Mansions, and for my multitude of reader, time for another song from the wonderful Karine Polwart, about the end of winter and the coming of spring, with all the usual metaphorical richness relating to relationships, life, the whole business.

And there's a good feeling of acceptance in the last verse: we need the sermons of ice and salt water and stone, but we also need - daffodils. Don't we?

The clip has slightly scratchy sound quality, but don't you love the mud on her boots (festival time) and the nervy immediacy she brings to her singing? Live, indeed. Blessings upon her head, and yours, and mine too - it's SPRING!

Follow The Heron

The back of the winter is broken
And light lingers long by the door
And the seeds of the summer have spoken
In gowans that bloom on the shore

CHORUS
By night and day we’ll sport and we’ll play
And delight as the dawn dances over the bay
Sleep blows the breath of the morning away
And we follow the heron home

In darkness we cradled our sorrow
And stoked all our fires with fear
Now these bones that lie empty and hollow
Are ready for gladness to cheer

CHORUS

So long may you sing of the salmon
And the snow scented sounds of your home
While the north wind delivers its sermon
Of ice and salt water and stone

CHORUS X 2

Evolution, comfort, Mrs and Mrs Darwin in grief

Last post was about evolution and how accepting it might be a liberating thing, might help us accept the impossibility, the outrage, of our own mortality.

But it's not always easy, is it? Even in the abstract. 

I think way back I posted a clip of this song, performed and co-written by Karine Polwart. I thought I'd pop it up again - it still works powerfully on me. The setting is Mr and Mrs Darwin grieving for the death of their daughter. 

I won't put up the clip of KP singing it, because you might just want to regard it as a poem as well as a song, it seems that strong and true to me.

We all look for comforts and supports; Darwin builds his own cathedral....

We're All Leaving

There is thunder on the skyline
And it tears her breath away
Like the twilight steals the day

A father's kind hand could not command her
To return to him once more
Like a soldier from the war

We're all leaving
Even the ones who stay behind
We're all leaving in our own time
We're all leaving in our own time

Each night surrenders to a morning
But beneath the April sky
He can hear an endless cry

On smiling fields there's a battle raging
And for every bloom he knows
Another flower never grows

We're all leaving …

And he has no Ark to bear him from this Flood
Just a broken vessel wrought in flesh and blood
Though the riptides pull him under
He will not cease to wonder
At the beauty, beauty, beauty, beauty

He brings her mother to the church door
And while she prays for what will come
He walks those woods alone

And there he builds his own cathedrals
And on every whirring wing
He can hear the whole world sing

We're all leaving …

Words & Music: Karine Polwart (Bay Songs 2009) & Dave Gunning (SOCAN)

Cycle of the Seasons personified - "The January Man," sung by Karine Polwart with Lau

Oh the January man he walks abroad in woollen coat and boots of
leather
The February man still wipes the snow from off his hair and blows
his hand
The man of March he sees the Spring and wonders what the year
will bring
And hopes for better weather
Through April rain the man goes down to watch the birds come in
to share the summer
The man of May stands very still watching the children dance away
the day
In June the man inside the man is young and wants to lend a hand
And grins at each new comer
And in July the man in cotton shirts he sits and thinks on being
idle
The August man in thousands take the road and watch the sea and
find the sun
September man is standing near to saddle up and lead the year
And Autumn is his bridle
The man of new October takes the reins and early frost is on his
shoulder
The poor November man sees fire and wind and mist and rain and
winter air
December man looks through the snow to let eleven brothers know
They're all a little older
And the January man comes round again in woollen coat and boots
of leather
To take another turn and walk along the icy road he knows so well
The January man is here for starting each and every year
Along the way for ever

Song by Dave Gould, sung by Karine Polwart with Lau, a Scots folk band. Not her song, but a lovely one, I think.

This one is for people who feel that keeping in close contact with the cycle of the seasons, of birth, growth, decline, death, birth etc. - that close contact helps us feel at home here and now, on this planet, and stops us worrying so much about our own mortality. It helps us to find a fit.

Hope you don't feel I've been over-exposing Ms KP too much - no kick-backs for me! - but if you agree that she writes increasingly unusual and excellent songs and has a lovely voice, then I'm happy to celebrate her work. Also, we should buy the CDs of such people, and not just copy them or flip around YouTube, because it's hard enough for unusual talents to earn much money nowadays. This track is on an EP CD you can buy on her website.

Karine Polwart - I'm Gonna Do It All

OK, if you've stayed with me through mind/body stuff and meaning of life/fear of death stuff, here's something by way of relief which I hope you find delightful, as I do. It's about how we yearn to do more, to do it all, whether we're as young as the delightful lass in the promo, or seven times her age. See, I'm torn between Horace and his instructions to prune back the unrealistic ambitions so we can sieze the day, and feeling that it's maybe a good thing to go on wanting to "do it all someday."
Anyway, over to Karine Polwart and her young friend.