Author: Alex

George Papavgeris 2002

 

“inspired by the well-known 70’s picture of the young hippy lass putting a flower into the muzzle of a soldier’s gun. Young ideals so often – unfortunately – get watered down as one grows older.”

Where are the flowers that we put into the muzzles of the guns? Dried up and pressed inside a frame, they never get a second glance. The love that we would banish war with, on bombed out streets now naked stands. Where are the flowers that we put into the muzzles of the guns? Where is the innocence of youth, the stars that once were in our eyes When did we learn to cover truth with our excuses and our lies? When did our ideals falter? Tell me, when did we change our plans? Where are the flowers that we put into the muzzles of the guns? Our lives from others we have learned to separate From evil we avert our eyes. More often war it is, and not love that we make And all the time we compromise. We used to turn the other cheek, but now we turn our face away. We were the blessed and the meek; our future brighter than the day. But we’ve forgotten Luther’s message; we never ask ourselves, not once: Where are the flowers that we put into the muzzles of the guns? But we’ve arrived, and as we pat each other’s backs Our principles we now betray And year on year as we progress and we advance, It’s not just hair that’s turning grey… Where are the flowers that we put into the muzzles of the guns? Where are the lessons we would pass on to our daughters and our sons? And did we ever make a difference? and did we ever stand a chance? Where are the flowers that we put into the muzzles of the guns?

 

 

Nancy Kerr 2010

Kerr says that as she transitioned from playing traditional music to writing her own material, she sought a balance between more trad-sounding songs and more poppy songs, which she feels this is.

Nancy Kerr & James Fagan: https://kerrfagan.bandcamp.com/track/flower-pickers-song

A bunch of flowers and a sore half hour
Before these seedling sunflowers see me out of here
Another day by the grey highway
The fairest flowers fade my dear

A clutch of red petals that hangs it head
The way you did the day we shared our parting tears
An hour or two quickened by dreams of you
The fairest flowers fade my dear

Chorus:
Silver sand trickling through my hand
And other people trade those feeble alibis
Another sky where the free birds fly
The fairest flowers fade my dear

A splash of blue cracking the sky in two
A thunder train that tracks my spirits out of here
A cloud of rain seeding my dreams in vain
The fairest flowers fade my dear

A nest of leaves, rustling memories
The offerings we bought and lived and laid in here
A hutch of souls, huddled like Russian dolls
The fairest flowers fade my dear 

Hedy West 1962

If you miss the train I’m on, you will know that I am gone,
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles.

Refrain:
Hundred miles, a hundred miles, a hundred miles, a hundred miles.
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles.

If my honey said so, I’d railroad no more,
I’d sidetrack my engine and go home.

Lord, I’m one, Lord, I’m two, Lord, I’m three, Lord, I’m four,
Lord, I’m five hundred miles away from home.

I told my little Ella, just as plain as I could tell her
That she’d better come along and go with me.

My clothes are all worm and my shoes are all torn,
Lord, I can’t make a livin’ this a-way.

If this train runs on right, I’ll be home tomorrow night,
For I’m coming down the line on Number Nine.

Not a shirt on my back, not a penny to my name,
Lord, I can’t go back home this a-way.

If you miss the train I’m on, You will know that I am gone
You can hear the whistle blow a hundred miles. 

Stan Rogers 

"The last song written for this particular album. 'The Citadel' is, of course, Citadel Hill in Halifax, and the ship with 'her picture on a dime' is, of course, the Bluenose. A pox on all those who tear down the old merely to make way for something new."

It was in the spring this year of grace, with new life pushing through
That I looked from the citadel down to the narrows and asked what it’s coming to
I saw Upper Canadian concrete and glass right down to the water line
And I heard an old song down on Fisherman’s Wharf Can I sing it just one time

With half-closed eyes against the sun, for the warm wind giving thanks
I dreamed of the years of the deep-laden schooners thrashing home from the Grand Banks
The last lies done in the harbour sun with her picture on a dime
I have heard an old song down on Fisherman’s Wharf, can I sing it just one time

Chorus:
And haul away and heave her home, this song is heard no more
No boats to sing them for, no sails to sing them for
There rises now a single tide of tourists passing through
We traded old ways for the new
Old ways for the new Old ways for the new

For the new Now you ask “What’s this romantic boy, Who laments what’s done and gone?”
There was no romance on a cold winter ocean and the gale sang an awful song
But my fathers knew of wind and tide, and my blood is Maritime
And I heard an old song down on Fisherman’s Wharf Can I sing it just one time 

Stan Rogers 1978

"This song was first performed in Sylvia Tyson's living room at a musical Christmas party that was taped for broadcast on CBC Radio's late, lamented and sadly missed 'Touch the Earth'. Since we did this album we haven't played this song on stage very often. Garnet says, with some justification, that it is too much of a downer. Definitely a three-hankie song."

This day a year ago, he was rolling in the snow
With a younger brother in his father’s yard
Christmas break, a time for touching home,
The heart of all he’d known
And leaving was so hard
Three thousand miles away, Now he’s working Christmas Day
Making double time for the minding of the store
Well he always said, he’d make it on his own
He’s spending Christmas Eve alone
First Christmas away from home

She’s standing by the train station, Pan-handling for change
Four more dollars buys a decent meal and a room
Looks like the Sally Ann place after all,
In a crowded sleeping hall
That echoes like a tomb
But it’s warm and clean and free, And there are worse places to be
At least it means no beating from her Dad
And if she cries because it’s Christmas Day
She hopes that it won’t show
First Christmas away from home

Bridge 1:
In the apartment stands a tree,
And it looks so small and bare Not like it was meant to be,
Golden angel on the top It’s not that same old silver star,
You wanted for your own
First Christmas away from home

In the morning, they get prayers, Then it’s crafts and tea downstairs
Then another meal back in his little room
Hoping maybe that “the boys” Will think to phone
before the day is gone
Well, it’s best they do it soon
When the “old girl” passed away, He fell apart more every day
Each had always kept the other pretty well
But the kids all said the nursing home was best
Cause he couldn’t live alone
First Christmas away from home

Bridge 2:
In the common room they’ve got the biggest tree
And it’s huge and cold and lifeless Not like it ought to be,
And the lit-up flashing Santa Claus on top It’s not that same old silver star,
You once made for your own
First Christmas away from home 

Hazel Dickens 1950s

Windborne: https://windborne.bandcamp.com/track/fire-in-the-hole

You can tell them in the country, tell them in the town
Miners down in Mingo laid their shovels down
We won’t pull another pillar, load another ton
Or lift another finger until the union we have won

Chorus:
Stand up boys, let the bosses know
Turn your buckets over, turn your lanterns low
There’s fire in our hearts and fire in our soul
But there ain’t gonna be no fire in the hole

Daddy died a miner and grandpa he did too,
I’ll bet this coal will kill me before my working days is through
And a hole this dark and dirty an early grave I find
And I plan to make a union for the ones I leave behind 

trad 

I thought I heard our old man say,

Chorus:
Fire down belo-o-o-o-ow, boys
Fire down below!

You can go ashore and get your pay.

I don’t care what the captain say,

Two pound ten won’t pay my way,

I’ll take my clothes and run away,

I’ll run away at the break of day,

Because I can no longer stay,

I’ll go to my girl round ‘Frisco Bay;

I know very well ’tis with me she will stay.

Because she know I have twelve months pay,

And we’ll go down to the Midway Plasances,

I thought I heard our captain say,

You can go ashore and get your pay! 

Archie Fisher 1977?

"inspired by a pair of rusting decommissioned trawlers off Scrabster Harbour. The death of a boat is the first casualty in the decline of a fishing community. This song is dedicated to all of the hardy fisherfolk at sea and ashore."

Now it’s three long years since we made her pay (Sing “Haul away”, my laddie-o)
And the owners say that she’d had her day (And sing “Haul away”, my laddie-o)

So heave away for the final trawl
It’s an easy pull, for the catch is small

Then’s stow your gear, lads, and batten down
And I’ll take the wheel, lads, and I’ll turn her ’round

And we’ll join the Venture and the Morning Star
Riding high and empty towards the bar

For I’d rather beach her on the Skerry Rock
Than to see her torched in the breaker’s dock

And when I die you can stow me down
In her rusty hold, where the breakers pound

Then I’d make the haven of Fiddlers Green
Where the grub is good and the bunks are clean

For I’ve fished a lifetime, boy and man
And the final trawl scarcely makes a cran 

Nancy Kerr 2013

"Written on a stirring spring morning in a city garden, remembering older summers and tunes played in wild places. A fiftieth birthday present for our dear friend Steve Hunt."

The Melrose Quartet: https://melrosequartet.bandcamp.com/track/fifty-verses

Chorus:
See how the season is starting something
The swift unearthing of a summer long
And thrifty voices do greet the dawning
With fifty verses of a longer song

On yonder alder the red wood growing
As he grows older does grow more grand
His bark and berries do soothe the sorrows
Of every woman and every man

The sea remembers on an eve in August
Our driftwood fire like a burning man
We blew the embers and in the morning
Had fishes flying into the pan

The stars are burning to light the evening
And a clifftop morning will breeze along
Just fifty turnings in a longer living
Just fifty verses of a longer song 

Stan Rogers 

Watch the field behind the plow turn to straight dark rows
Feel the trickle in your clothes, blow the dusk cake from your nose
And hear the tractor’s steady roar, O you can’t stop now
There’s a quarter section more or less to go

And it figures that the rain takes it’s own sweet time
You can watch it come for miles, but you guess you’ve got a while
Ease the throttle out a hair, every rod’s a gain
There’s victory in every quarter mile

Bridge 1:
Poor old Kuzyk down the road The heartache, hail and hoppers got him down
He gave it up and went to town
And Emmett Pierce, the other day took a heart attack and died at 42
You could see it comin’ on, ‘cuz he worked as hard as you

Well in an hour, maybe more, you’ll be wet clear through
The air is cooler now, pull your hat brim further down
And watch the field behind the plow turn to straight dark rows
Put another season’s promise in the ground

Bridge 2:
And if the harvest’s any good, the money might just cover all the loans
You’ve mortgaged all you own
Buy the kids a winter coat, take the wife back east for Christmas if you can
All summer she hangs on when you’re so tied to the land

For the good times come and go, but at least there’s rain
So this won’t be barren ground when September comes around
And watch the field behind the plow turn to straight dark rows
Put another season’s promise in the ground