Silver drums, rhythms that he hums Waltzing dogs, that come when he calls Plans for one he keeps in a coffer What can I offer, I don't know Can I bring him love words to sing him Like some foolish magi I'll be gone and words in a song Won't even last till sunrise Go tell the drummer man The time glass is out of sand Ask him to understand And wait for me, and wait for me Streets and parks Waltzes in the dark Lovers now, when time will allow An afternoon, the kind to believe in Why am I leaving? I don't know Distant places, just empty spaces Till we are together What can I bring, time leaves me nothing I wonder will it ever Go tell the drummer man The time glass is out of sand Ask him to understand And wait for me, and wait for me Silver birds fly away like words In the wind, and soon I'll be in Another world The land of without him What's it about, this other world Go tell the drummer man The time glass is out of sand Ask him to understand And wait for me, and wait for me --Joni Mitchell (1943- ), Canadian singer-songwriter, artist, and poet, unreleased song written in 1967 Image: Ginger Baker, drummer for Cream, who passed away earlier this month.
There's a man who's been out sailing In a decade full of dreams And he takes her to a schooner And he treats her like a queen Bearing beads from California With their amber stones and green He has called her from the harbor He has kissed her with his freedom He has heard her off to starboard In the breaking and the breathing Of the water weeds While she was busy being free There's a man who's climbed a mountain And he's calling out her name And he hopes her heart can hear Three thousand miles he calls again He can think her there beside him He can miss her just the same He has missed her in the forest While he showed her all the flowers And the branches sang the chorus As he climbed the scaley towers Of a forest tree While she was somewhere being free There's a man who's sent a letter And he's waiting for reply He has asked her of her travels Since the day they said goodbye He writes "Wish you were beside me We can make it if we try" He has seen her at the office With her name on all his papers Thru the sharing of the profits He will find it hard to shake her From his memory And she's so busy being free There's a lady in the city And she thinks she loves them all There's the one who's thinking of her There's the one who sometimes calls There's the one who writes her letters With his facts and figures scrawl She has brought them to her senses They have laughed inside her laughter Now she rallies her defenses For she fears that one will ask her For eternity And she's so busy being free There's a man who sends her medals He is bleeding from the war There's a jouster and a jester And a man who owns a store There's a drummer and a dreamer And you know there may be more She will love them when she sees them They will lose her if they follow And she only means to please them And her heart is full and hollow Like a cactus tree * While she's so busy being free -- Joni Mitchell (1943- ), Canadian singer-songwriter and artist, from Song to a Seagull, 1968
Fly silly seabird No dreams can possess you No voices can blame you For sun on your wings My gentle relations Have names they must call me For loving the freedom Of all flying things My dreams with the seagulls fly Out of reach out of cry I came to the city And lived like old Crusoe On an island of noise In a cobblestone sea And the beaches were concrete And the stars paid a light bill And the blossoms hung false On their store window trees My dreams with the seagulls fly Out of reach out of cry Out of the city And down to the seaside To sun on my shoulders And wind in my hair But sandcastles crumble And hunger is human And humans are hungry For worlds they can't share My dreams with the seagulls fly Out of reach out of cry I call to a seagull Who dives to the waters And catches his silver-fine Dinner alone Crying where are the footprints That danced on these beaches And the hands that cast wishes That sunk like a stone My dreams with the seagulls fly Out of reach out of cry --Joni Mitchell (1943- ), Canadian singer-songwriter, poet, and artist, from Song to a Seagull, 1966
I was driving across the burning desert When I spotted six jet planes Leaving six white vapor trails across the bleak terrain It was the hexagram of the heavens it was the strings of my guitar Amelia, it was just a false alarm The drone of flying engines Is a song so wild and blue It scrambles time and seasons if it gets through to you Then your life becomes a travelogue Of picture-post-card-charms Amelia, it was just a false alarm People will tell you where they've gone They'll tell you where to go But till you get there yourself you never really know Where some have found their paradise Others just come to harm Oh Amelia, it was just a false alarm I wish that he was here tonight It's so hard to obey His sad request of me to kindly stay away So this is how I hide the hurt As the road leads cursed and charmed I tell Amelia, it was just a false alarm A ghost of aviation She was swallowed by the sky Or by the sea, like me she had a dream to fly Like Icarus ascending On beautiful foolish arms Amelia, it was just a false alarm Maybe I've never really loved I guess that is the truth I've spent my whole life in clouds at icy altitude And looking down on everything I crashed into his arms Amelia, it was just a false alarm I pulled into the Cactus Tree Motel To shower off the dust And I slept on the strange pillows of my wanderlust I dreamed of 747's Over geometric farms Dreams, Amelia, dreams and false alarms --Joni Mitchell (1943- ), Canadian singer-songwriter, artist, and poet, from Hejira, 1976 A link to the NPR report on the tribute to Joni Mitchell's Blue performed by Brandi Carlile. A Live performance from 1979 by Joni Mitchell:
A dazzling cover by Roxana Amed and Pedro Aznar in Spanish:
