Selected Lyrics
One Voice
In the garden of consciousness
In fertile mind there lies the
dormant seed
Blooming into charity
Let love resound
If he be mute
Give him a bell
If he be blind an eye
If he be down a hand
Boy Cried Wolf
I am the body I am the stream
I am the wake of everything
Torn reborn the cries of our
dismay
are nothing to the wind
Persuasion
What is the system that gets
around
recruits heart with its
timeless rhythm
the young glow but old men
know
it’s all a part of some crazy
schism
true love is so complicated
what is the rise without the
fall
what is illusion without
beauty
you can’t prepare for the
heart’s invasion
love is its own persuasion
China Bird
my china bird is calling for
you
the open skies are yearning
for you
if they say it’s not that way,
hold your view and with my love, fly above,
light anew, spread your wings
the open sky is calling to
you, china bird, my heart is yearning for you
if you fly away I’ll be
waiting, some what may,
all my love a fragile ray for you
(in memory of her father, Grant H. Smith)
Grateful
Ours is just another skin
that simply slips away
you can rise above it
it will shed easily
Ours is just a craving
and a twist of the wrist
will undo the stopper
with abrupt tenderness
die little sparrow
and awake singing
(for Jerry Garcia 1942-95 of the Grateful Dead)
New Party
Why don’t fertilize my lawn with what’s running from your
mouth
Mother Rose
Mother rose every little morn’
to tend to me
There she stood, waiting by
the door, selflessly
Took my hand, took it tenderly
Now’s the time to turn the
view, Now that I have you
And I’ll rise every little
morn’ to tend to thee
When you rise, open up your
eyes, you will see
There I’ll be, waiting by the
door
Come to me, take my hand
Look into your heart, there I’ll
be
(for her mother, Beverly Williams Smith)
Cartwheels
Your thoughts are darting like
a rabbit
Like a rabbit cross the moon
Shining a light over your hair
As boys croon
Hearing a voice, you turn your
head
You vanish, vanish into the
mist
Of your thoughts
(for her daughter, Jess Paris Smith)
Trespasses
Life is designed with
unfinished lines that another sings
Each story unfolds like it was
gold upon a ragged wing.
The bold and the fair suffer
their share
He whispered to his kin
All of my debts, left with
regrets, I’m sorry for everything.
Trespasses stretch like broken
fences, winding as they may
Trespasses stretch like broken
fences
Hope to mind them one day.
And she pinned back her hair,
shouldered with care the burdens that
were his,
Mending the coat that hung on
the post, in heart remembering.
And her time was to come,
calling to her son
This your song to sing
All of our debts wove with
regrets upon a golden string.
And he found the old coat hung
on a post like a ragged wing
And took as his own, the sewn
and unsown
Joyfully whistling.
Cash
Curve of life spiraling
Everything we’ve ever known
It’s only time that you’re
cashing in
In the white noise of desire
We can’t hear a single thing
Floating ‘round the fragile
bough
Afflictions of the human soul
Its beauty immaterial
It’s only time you spend
It’s only life that you’re
cashing in
