Dave Carter 2001
“I was thinking one night about the planet and about a conversation with a friend in Texas, Tom Noe. I started thinking about gods and goddesses, more about goddesses. I woke up the next morning with this song in my head. It’s not one I can take credit for having written, like Dylan says, I just wrote it down. Twenty-five minutes later I had the whole thing. Kinda an eco-spirituality number.”
Dave Carter & Tracy Grammar: https://davecartertracygrammer.bandcamp.com/track/gentle-arms-of-eden
https://davecartertracygrammer.bandcamp.com/track/gentle-arms-of-eden
On a sleepy endless ocean when the world lay in a dream, There was rhythm in the splash and roll, but not a voice to sing; So the moon shone on the breakers and the morning warmed the waves Till a single cell did jump and hum for joy as though to say: CHORUS: This is my home; this is my only home. This is the only sacred ground that I have ever known; And should I stray in the dark night alone. Rock me, goddess, in the gentle arms of Eden. Then the day shone bright and rounder till the one turned into two, And the two into ten thousand things, and old things into new; And on some virgin beachhead one lonesome critter crawled, And he looked about and shouted out in his most astonished drawl: Then all the sky was buzzing and the ground was carpet green, And the wary children of the wood went dancing in between, And the people sang rejoicing when the field was glad with grain This song of celebration from their cities on the plain: Now there’s smoke across the harbor, and there’s factories on the shore, And the world is ill with greed and will and enterprise of war; But I will lay my burden in the cradle of your grace, And the shining beaches of your love and the sea of your embrace.