Staying Home Tonight

Along the purple ridges I see my daughter climb

Hand in hand with Timothy and they'll be gone for hours.

Love is rising with the spring, does it all the time;

They go now where once I went, searching for the flowers.

Lavender and gold they glow, hiding in the shade,

Tip them up and drink the sweetest juice God ever made.

Share them for the memories and for the luck they bring:

Flahmen lurk where lovers go, rising with the spring.

Along the purple ridges, I watch their slow descent,

Holding empty baskets, faces scared and drawn.

Hand in hand for comfort now, troubled and intent:

Ask "What can be happening with all the flahmen gone?"

Lavender and gold the sky, scarlet sunset threads,

Half the world is dying when the flahmen all are dead.

Soon will fall the other half; we work while we may,

Building the machineries to take ourselves away.

Along the purple ridges, my daughter walks alone,

All her blooming prospects for love are turning gray.

She'll ship with our family and Timmy with his own.

Will they ever find each other, endless stars away?

Lavender and gold the light that nearly leaves me blind:

Hear the Presence call to me to leave this life behind!

Woven joy and sorrow as I sort out last affairs

And my smile greets my daughter's heavy tread upon the stairs.

Along the purple ridges, I watch the ships depart,

Timmy with my daughter in the space I didn't use.

No one knows the future but they'll have a chance to start,

And I am left alone upon a world I needn't lose.

Lavender and gold the sun, brighter every day,

My world and I are dying but my people are away.

In joy we die together, our faces toward the light:

An aging world and woman who are staying home tonight.

Odd stanzas:

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D D Em A

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D G Em-A D

Even stanzas:

D Em G D

D D Em A

D Em G A

D Em G-A D