Long song about the good and bad of life and to live a gainful life one has to take both. Acoustic guitars, bass, vocal harmony.
acoustic guitar
I'm a folky acoustic guitar player/singer. I thought this might be a good place to make some of my music available on the web.
Story behind the song
I wrote this song 13 or 14 years ago after going through some difficulties that made me realize there is often bitterness mixed in with good things and I better learn to not reject the good because of the hard things mixed in there. To do so is to blow off way too much of one's life.
The song speaks of several different people: my wife, a baby we lost, a composite of several women I have known, C.S. Lewis, and my father. I thought I had the song finished in late '94 when my father died suddenly. A day or two after his death I added the last verse.
My buddy since the 7th grade, Larry Robinson, helped me polish the lyrics as well as tried to help me polish my life when I was going through the kind of stuff that breeds such a song.
Lyrics
When we are young and our life is at the start
We tend to seek perfection in matters of the heart
We want the happy ever after, the fun, the joy, the sweet
But often plans are compromised and goals left incomplete
The hard times come, sometimes bitter defeat
The good we find is often bittersweet
You fall in love and marry, expecting such a treat
You think that you can live on love and never have to eat
But good and bad and happy-sad can blend to tones of grey
The joy, the pain, the loss, the gain, the hard work and the play
To live together is no easy feat
And loving her can be bittersweet
(chorus:)
If all I want is sweet and never seize the day complete
Most of life will pass me by
There is so much to gain from the joy that's mixed with pain
So much of life is bittersweet
Give me a taste for bittersweet
A little baby girl saw the light begin to shine
But just one struggling hour was all she knew of time
Her name was all that we could give her, we had to let her go
Ten perfect little fingers, ten perfect little toes
Good-bye to little hands and little feet
A fleeting, life-long taste of bittersweet
A pretty, green-eyed lady, but she is not your wife
You know that you could love her in another life
And something makes you think that she might feel the way you do
But at home is one who is your own who needs you to be true
You pray for strength your promises to keep
And knowing her becomes bittersweet
(repeat chorus)
A wise one walked through most of life with no one by his side
But then he came upon a love from which he could not hide
He knew she had a hurt that they both knew would not heal
But gladly he embraced the terms required of the deal
The pain to come made present joy complete
He drained the cup and savored bittersweet
His life was in the autumn season, his colors blazing bright
And suddenly God took him in the middle of the night
The solid hardwood fell before the winter limbs were bare
So long before we thought he would he ran up heaven's stair
But downward flowed a supernatural calm
And loosing him became a healing balm
Smoldering embers burst aflame with heat
A devastating gain of bittersweet
So much of life is bittersweet
