Search results for 'rails of the stern'

If I Didn't Love You

Steve Wariner

Super Hits

1998

If I didn't love you
I could be wild as a gypsy
Doin' just what I please
Back to the past and my thumb in the breeze
I might be free, but where would I be
If I didn't love you, If I didn't love you
I could row down a river and never come back
Ride on a rail 'til I run out of track
It wouldn't matter, that's a matter of fact
If I didn't love you, If I didn't love you
If I didn't love you, I'd never have found
These sweet ties that bind without weighin' me down
If I didn't love you, I'd have nothing to give
I'd spend a lifetime and never have lived
If I didn't love you, If I didn't love you
I could sail the high sea with my stern to the wind
A mind full of memories of the places I've been
I'd still be waitin' for my ship to come in
If I didn't love you, If I didn't love you
If I didn't love you, I'd never have found
These sweet ties that bind without weighin' me down
If I didn't love you, I'd have nothin' to give
I'd spend a lifetime and never have lived
If I didn't love you, If I didn't love you
If I didn't love you, If I didn't love you
(If I didn't love you), If I didn't love you

Hiking trails
Run off the rails
Mosquitos, tigers and blue whales
The going not knowing whereto
The fireman, the brave again
The holy or the business men 
The falling not knowing how deep

You know things never dried out here
That time turns water crystal clear
Come clean, the deck and stern
Come clean, the mold, the burn

You are only one step away
From bloom, stagnation or decay
But coming here feeling all shipwrecked
Doesn't change a thing for me in fact

Come clean

Glide out through the harbor's mouth
Daylight drawn gossamer-thin
One hand on the rail as we come about
And lean into the damp, salt wind

A sigh from the Sound
As the sun falls down
Past the low Connecticut shoreline

The cars below queue in obedient rows
Nestled in from stern to prow
While every word she ever said
Rushes like sand through the funnel of now

And the gray clouds weep, "she's gone, she's gone"
And the engines hum, "be strong"
And the wake churns out its angry song

Out on the deck, a hardy few
Clutch at their caps and coats
And brave the chill to watch the shadow of
Mount Misery Point approach

The sky gone black
Too late to look back
At the low Connecticut shoreline

We clung to the rail like sodden rats
With our wizened tails entwined
And spoke our mind
Giving all where just one would suffice
In our drinking grown akin

These days, when the light of reason
Has dimmed to a candles sputtering flame
Who's to blame?

We stand on the deck on the stern of the ship
The Captain and I
Watching the wake, as backwards we look
On time gone by
As we relive the year and the very long days
The winds of change are rustling the sails

It's calm out tonight, with the salty spray
From zephyr winds across my face
We stand in silence, the Captain and I
Gazing back on time gone by
But it hasn't always been like this

I think of the time when I clung to the rail
When anchor and rope and hope had failed
I think of the noise of the pounding rain
The jars and the jolts of a craft in pain
When boom and sail and faith had been flailing
My footing in torrents of fear derailing
The crash of those waves still makes me quiver
For even the very timbers had shivered
I think of them battering all thru that night
And I wonder how I had even survived

We stand at the bow, at the front of the ship
The Captain and I
Watching the waters, watching the sky
Watching the hours passing by
The ship is surging, gaining on
Slicing into a future unknown

I wonder if other tempests may break
And what of the damage that's left in their wake
He seems to be hearing my every thought
And sensing the angst in which I was caught
But calm is his voice and steady his hand
My child, not if, but when

I glance at his firm and resolute face
And he draws me close into his embrace
And somehow the thought of His presence with me
During and after and in between
Felt infinitely safety more
Than sailing outside of any storm

The waters may not be safe
But He is
The weather may not be calm
But He is
The waves may not be gentle
But He is
The way may not be sure
But He is

As Ahab now glided from the dejected Delight, the strange life-buoy hanging at the Pequod's stern came into conspicuous relief. 

 

Ha! yonder! look yonder, men! cried a foreboding voice in her wake.

The words are separated from their meaning
And truth is separated from the fact
The vermin have consumed the trail of breadcrumbs
Now I’m scared there’s no way back

Aint that the way you slide
A sleepwalk to the darker side
And love is not the answer I’m afraid
The moment came and I just stood and watched it happened
And I’m ashamed

I spend my money in the usual places
I buy a lot of shit that I don’t need
I recognise the frailty of the age in terms of lust and hate and greed
But never see it in my own reflection
I don’t consider that I’m one of these oblivious, self-interested fools
Content to live and die on bended knees

Like I’m the servant of a natural order
And never happier than when I’m crushed
beneath the looming, loving leather boot
of that sweet oppression I’ve come to trust
like it’s the only thing that keeps me grounded
that helps instill in me a sense of pride
the daunting odds I strive to overcome
but in truth I barely even tried

Aint that just the way you find
Your aspirations get resigned
And love is not the answer I’m afraid
The moment came and I just turned and looked away
And I’m ashamed

Everybody tells it like it is
But every day the same old sun comes up on days like this

I cannot raise an army
But I will not raise the flag
I’ll call myself a rebel, scream seditious words into a paper bag
And make believe that it could make a difference
And maybe this time we can start a fire
By preaching eloquent, impassioned testimony only to the choir

It’s not important that you stand for something
You just need something you can rail against
The mortal sin of the poorly chosen word
Or a joke that may just cause offence
But any God without a sense of humour
Is not a deity that I could love
And who would choose eternity in a stern, unsmiling paradise above?

Mum hisses beside me
Then I realise they're calling the graduates
To the front of the stage
I make my way down the stairs towards
The pool of eligible young people
Standing amongst the crowd of adolescents
Struck by the nauseating mix
Of perfume and aftershave i look around
Still half expecting to see Lisa wanting to
Lisa would have laughed at my blistered heels
She would have put bandaids on
At home before she left
She was always so prepared

I smile at a girl who's playing
Nervously with a handkerchief beside me
She smiles back
And I feel a little less alone
I look around again
Searching for a face I might recognise
I had promised myself I wouldn't be nervous
A part of me is worried that I might
Get the same job as my internship
But I'm trying not to think
Of that exceptional torture
Anyway, it doesn't matter what position
I get placed in
I will always have to watch myself
If losing Lisa taught me anything, it's that

A vacant sort of resignation
Settles in my chest
I watch some girls giggling
Their arms linked
Many of the boys are slapping
Each other on the shoulder, friends
While we mill around
The great Councillor Corrumpere
Is still talking like all the others
I hardly pay any attention i move around
Listening to the hushed chatter mixing
In with her speech

"Jubilee, I hope we're together, chosen ones
Anything but that" someone bumps me
I look up and realise how close
I am to the imposing stage
"Alright children, " the councillor
Calls us to attention
Her spiel to the parents concluded
"You are our next generation
Our greatest achievement
You are the future Our Metropolis City"
Her words have a silencing effect
On the gathered youth we are all still
She looks at us through
Her watery, grey eyes, hungry
I can see now that up closer
Her teeth aren't sharp
But I still can't shake the
Image from my mind

"I will call our children
To the stage individually
Each will receive their job placement then
Return to their family seating
Please hold any applause to the end"
That last request is accompanied by a
Stern look at the gathered audience
I don't think anyone would
Dare defy that look

I feel a twisting knot of
Anticipation form in my stomach
Stop it, this doesn't mean anything
But still, it churns
A glance around tells me I'm not the only one

"Pretty intense, huh?"