Words & Music: The i's Have It - Joni Mitchell & Patti Griffin

For National Poetry Month, I'm offering up Songwriter Sundays, featuring musicians who pipe us into that that misty and often numinous realm on the border between poetry and lyrics.

Try these two, all ye poets and musicians.  You know them, but recall how much you love them today.
Two singer-songwriters and one stellar chanteuse whose lyrics are almost always poetry.

First, Patti Griffin:  "Long Ride Home".  Quite the stunner.  You'll see here that fans adore this tune, and I do too:  It's a character-driven story and the narrator is decidedly not the singer.  And it will haunt you, even if you've  never encountered as situation in any way similar.  This video might not be as clear as some visually, but you can hear the lyrics more clearly than in the others. 

Everything this woman does is magic.  This one in particular.

Long black limousine

Shiniest car I've ever seen

The back seat is nice and clean

She rides as quiet as a dream

Someone dug a hole six long feet in the ground

I said goodbye to you and I threw my roses down

Ain't nothing left at all in the end of being proud

With me riding in this car, and you flying through the clouds

I've had some time to think about you

And watch the sun sink like a stone

I've had some time to think about you

On the long ride home

One day I took your tiny hand

Put your finger in the wedding band

Your daddy gave a piece of land

We laid ourselves the best of plans

Forty years go by with someone laying in your bed

Forty years of things you say you wish you'd never said

How hard would it have been to say some kinder words instead

I wonder as I stare up at the sky turning red

I've had some time to think about you

And watch the sun sink like a stone

I've had some time to think about you

On the long ride home

Headlights staring at the driveway

The house is dark as it can be

I go inside and all is silent

It seems as empty as the inside of me

I've had some time to think about you

And watch the sun sink like a stone

I've had some time to think about you

On the long, on the long

Oh the long, on the long

On the long ride home

And now, the icing on the proverbial cake...

Joni Mitchell's  "Woodstock" as sung by the late, great Eva Cassidy.  A classic sung by a brilliant songstress.  Meant to inspire you to enjoy every single moment today, and to look them both up and download a few tunes if you haven't already.

I came upon a child of god

He was walking along the road

And I asked him, where are you going

And this he told me

I’m going on down to Yasgur’s farm

I’m going to join in a rock n roll band

I’m going to camp out on the land

I’m going to try and get my soul free

We are stardust

We are golden

And we’ve got to get ourselves

Back to the garden

Then can I walk beside you

I have come here to lose the smog

And I feel to be a cog in something turning

Well maybe it is just the time of year

Or maybe it’s the time of man

I don’t know who l am

But you know life is for learning

We are stardust

We are golden

And we’ve got to get ourselves

Back to the garden

By the time we got to Woodstock

We were half a million strong

And everywhere there was song and celebration

And I dreamed I saw the bombers

Riding shotgun in the sky

And they were turning into butterflies

Above our nation

We are stardust

Billion year old carbon

We are golden

Caught in the devils bargain

And we’ve got to get ourselves

Back to the garden

Please support the songwriters and musicians who change us with their art.

Happy Sunny Sunday, and MFB as always,
L