I have been asked, How do you write? Sometimes, I have been asked in a journalistic way, sometimes a conversational, non chalant, how-do-you-do-that? way, sometimes by other writers. I have gone long periods of time without writing anything, nearly a decade quite recently and in those years I sometimes asked myself.
I have judged the songs I write as good or bad or worthy of keeping or throwing away. As I have in the last few years come back to the practice I am aware that songs I haven't played for a long time become inaccessible. I forget them. When I practice often it becomes easy to remember the ones I once knew and to learn songs. It becomes easier. Its a practice.
I think writing songs could be a practice, but when recently asked I have defaulted to saying, “I try to write from a stupid place.”
I think melodies and even ideas sort of exist around us not in a Victorian conciousness-floats-in-a-cloud-above-your-head kind of a way, more….
You can be aware of what is good without that thing already existing. It is recognizing what you have imagined to be a beautiful thing. It is as a practice perhaps more like catching fireflies than it is like shooting rabbits from the truck.
Things in your imagination are perhaps more like occurances and weather, or something flying through the night that is seemingly, at its own will occasionally alight, and only capturable then.
Sometimes I will hear people humming quietly to themselves at the grocery store, not a melody I recognize, just a rambling succession of notes for pleasure.
Words and melodies run through me like that all the time.
I don't find it hard to write words. It's easy but finding melodies and words that work can seem hard. It can seem important in a stifling way.
If I capture something that just occurs to me I can feel free of the responsibility of having invented it. The things I have put my name to and sung that I most like have felt accidental.
And this one captures that style of capture.
It had been nearly 80 degrees and then there was a cold snap and a bunch of snow. Spring in the midwest- full stop.
I had already started. I had the lines, ‘Song’s come out of the silence if you lend an ear. It’s when you go in after them that they become hart to hear.’
The rest of it was just describing my world.
I sleep by an open window year round and strong winds wake me. When it’s howling at night, I know I might not have the best sleep.
That's enough.
Songs come out of the silence if you lend an ear. It's when you go in after them that they become hard to hear. So don't you make a sound. Baby, don't you cry, and a song will sing you off to sleep, baby, right there where you lie. And when you close your eyes a song can be the light. Just breathe easy. Everything is gonna be all right. Just breathe easy. Everything is gonna be all right. The wind is gonna blow all night. Snow is gonna fly. The wind is gonna take the low ones, and the snow is gonna sing the high. And when the moon comes out the snow is gonna shine. Close your eyes and pull the blankets over as you imagine it in your mind. And when you close your eyes a song can be the light. Just breathe easy. Everything is gonna be all right. Just breathe easy. Everything is gonna be all right.
It's me telling myself to just breathe easy, but I am saying it out loud. I have often said, Anyone who tries to tell you the future is after your money. I suppose I stand by that.
It's your present moment that is real. All the rest, all of it is in a sense imagined.
This song is not for sale.
Here's a video.
