Lay of the Sunflower

by Robert Hunter

I must leave you for a season
Go out logging that hardwood timber
Hardwood timber that grows so low
In the forest of Fennario

Tell me what you need to live
Do you ask that you might own
Keep my blue-eyed hound to guard you
I will make my way alone

I will not return in winter
If I be not back by fall
Seek me when this small sunflower
Grows above the garden wall

Fare ye well, I would not weep
I bid you tend your prayers to keep
Hill by dale now must I go
To the forest of Fennario

Nine-month blew with sleeted rain
And still he came not back again
Summoned she the hound to go
To seek him in Fennario

He came back the fated day
To find his lady gone away
Made haste to follow in her track
Where she could go but not turn back

The blue-eyed hound at her side did bay
While fast her breath did fade away
She cried out, 'Turn, my love, and go
'I would not you see me so'

Fare ye well, I would not weep
Bid you tend your prayers to keep
Hill by dale now I must go
To the forest of Fennario

I shall not turn, I shall not yield
O selfsame serpent sting my heel
That bleeds my lady's blood away
Beside the blue-eyed hound to lay

Angels sing their souls to sleep
Four winds grace their breath to keep
Up above yon garden wall
Stands the sunflower, straight and tall

Fare ye well, I would not weep
Bid you tend your prayers to keep
Hill by dale now I must go
To the forest of Fennario

First Song That I Sing

by Sara Groves

In the morning when I rise
Help me to prioritize
All the thoughts that fill my day
Before my schedule
Tells me that my day is full
Before I'm off and on my way

I want to praise You
I need to praise You
Let the first song that I sing
Be praises to my God and King

Before the curtains part
Before my day is starting
Before I make up the bed
Before the snooze alarm
Reminds me that it's morning
Before the dreams have left my head

Before my feet hit the floor
I'll praise You, Lord
Before I fill my cup
I'll lift You up
Before I start my day
I'll sing Your praise
Before I start my car
Before I get too far

All Right Here

by Sara Groves

It's every loss and every love
It's every blessing from above
Here I am, all added up
It's all right here

It's what I know and what I'm guessing
It's half-truths and full confessions
It's why I choose to learn my lesson
It's all right here

And I'm not God, I'm a man, I confess
That I don't have a sea of forgetfulness
No, it's all right here

It makes me stronger, it makes me wince
It makes me think twice when I pick my friends
It's all right here

It's caution and curiousity
And it's all the things I never see
Welling up inside of me
It's all right here

It's what is best, and what is worse
It's how I see the universe
It's in every line and every verse
It's all right here

Every heart has so much history
It's my favorite place to start
Sit down a while and share your narrative with me
I'm not afraid of who you are

I'm all here, and you're all there
Some of this is unique, and some of it we share
Add it up and start from there
It's all right here

It's caution and curiousity
And it's all the things I never see
It's all right here

It's what is best and what is worse
It's how I see the universe
I'm all right here

Here's That Rainy Day

by Johnny Burke

Maybe I should have saved
Those leftover dreams
Funny, but here's that rainy day

Here's that rainy day
They told me about
And I laughed at the thought
That it might turn out this way

Where is that worn-out wish
That I threw aside
After it brought my lover near?

Funny how love becomes
A cold rainy day
Funny, that rainy day is here

Under the Milky Way

by Steve Kilbey

Sometimes when this place gets kind of empty
Some of the breath fades with the light
I think about the loveless fascination
Under the Milky Way tonight

Lower the curtain down on Memphis
Lower the curtain down, all right
I got no time for private consultation
Under the Milky Way tonight

Wish I knew what you were looking for
Might have known what you would find

And it's something quite peculiar
Something shimmering and white
It leads you here, despite your destination
Under the Milky Way tonight

Wish I knew what you were looking for
Might have known what you would find
Under the Milky Way tonight

It Is Well with My Soul

by Horatio Gates Spafford

When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

Though Satan should buffet, though trials should come,
Let this blest assurance control,
That Christ has regarded my helpless estate,
And hath shed His own blood for my soul.

My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought!
My sin, not in part but the whole,
Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more,
Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!

For me, be it Christ, be it Christ hence to live:
If Jordan above me shall roll,
No pang shall be mine, for in death as in life
Thou wilt whisper Thy peace to my soul.

But, Lord, 'tis for Thee, for Thy coming we wait,
The sky, not the grave, is our goal;
Oh trump of the angel! Oh voice of the Lord!
Blessèd hope, blessèd rest of my soul!

And Lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight,
The clouds be rolled back as a scroll;
The trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend,
Even so, it is well with my soul.

Ohio

by Neil Young

Tin soldiers and Nixon coming
We're finally on our own
This summer I hear the drumming
Four dead in Ohio

Got to get down to it
Soldiers are gunning us down
Should have been done long ago
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground?
How can you run when you know?

East Coker (Pt. II)

[Pt. I here]
by T.S. Eliot

What is the late November doing
With the disturbance of the spring
And creatures of the summer heat,
And snowdrops writhing under feet
And hollyhocks that aim too high
Red into grey and tumble down
Late roses filled with early snow?
Thunder rolled by the rolling stars
Simulates triumphal cars
Deployed in constellated wars
Scorpion fights against the Sun
Until the Sun and Moon go down
Comets weep and Leonids fly
Hunt the heavens and the plains
Whirled in a vortex that shall bring
The world to that destructive fire
Which burns before the ice-cap reigns.

That was a way of putting it—not very satisfactory:
A periphrastic study in a worn-out poetical fashion,
Leaving one still with the intolerable wrestle
With words and meanings. The poetry does not matter.
It was not (to start again) what one had expected.
What was to be the value of the long looked forward to,
Long hoped for calm, the autumnal serenity
And the wisdom of age? Had they deceived us
Or deceived themselves, the quiet-voiced elders,
Bequeathing us merely a receipt for deceit?
The serenity only a deliberate hebetude,
The wisdom only the knowledge of dead secrets
Useless in the darkness into which they peered
Or from which they turned their eyes. There is, it seems to us,
At best, only a limited value
In the knowledge derived from experience.
The knowledge imposes a pattern, and falsifies,
For the pattern is new in every moment
And every moment is a new and shocking
Valuation of all we have been. We are only undeceived
Of that which, deceiving, could no longer harm.
In the middle, not only in the middle of the way
But all the way, in a dark wood, in a bramble,
On the edge of a grimpen, where is no secure foothold,
And menaced by monsters, fancy lights,
Risking enchantment. Do not let me hear
Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly,
Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession,
Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God.
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire
Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.

The houses are all gone under the sea.

The dancers are all gone under the hill.

[Pt. III here]