Through my life I’ve collected voices
maybe twice a decade a new singer comes to me
and I can’t let it pass by
without holding tight
Through the years certain songs
seem magnetic, somehow
whole albums written in a style I know too well
for it to be coincidence
and I have to hold it close
When Joni sings of ‘skating away’
something jumped out of the speakers
and Leonard says a ‘highway curls up like smoke’
those lines leap out of my headphones
Georgie’s story and the way Rod tells it
grabs me by the lapels
Don’s road trip to the levy
those lines are etched beneath my skin
My mother, my mother played these songs to me
before I even took a breath
my mother, my mother played me these songs
before I ever took a breath
Songs from the womb
songs from before
come back and find me again…
[2019]
Thanks for reading.
The Lighthouse 
a long long time ago a former girlfriend’s mum gave me one of the best gifts I have ever received – a slightly battered copy of Joni’s Hissing of Summer Lawns LP.
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What a gift, Colin. Do you know why she chose to give that one to you? There’s something fascinating to me about when and how people connect with music. It was the power of great lyrics that inspired me to write back when I was an early teenager and I am so grateful for that.
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I think she’d just taken up with a new boyfriend who was into state of the art hi-fi and was in the process of upgrading her record collection so I got the old Joni and a Bob Dylan thrown in for good measure. Maybe she saw something beyond my spiky dyed punk hair?!
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I’d like to think the last part is true 🙂
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