#30: The River

I had the idea of writing a song about 'surrender' about 4 months ago when I started this project but I couldn't figure out what I actually wanted to say about the subject. When I read Carl Jung's biography his ideas about the absolute limitations of the psyche and our inability to understand the 'unknown' put the song on a path. But it wasn't until Tolstoy got me thinking about pre-determinism that this song really found it's tune. So this is my first song on a subject that's not easy to understand let alone write about so I hope some of what I've written makes a small amount of sense. I don't think I need to give any more clues to this song, I think the analogy is fairly straight forward. But please email me if you want some clarification on what's going on in this song. Actually I will explain one thing just in case, the 'lines on the cliff' are the horizontal lines on the rocky cliffs of a river bank. 

The river runs wild, the river runs free, we sit on the banks and think of our destiny. The river carves out a path, shapes the rocky cliffs, it's got time in it's pocket and creation in its hips. The water crashes on, the waves continue to roll, our lives on the shore are beyond our control. Cause we're not rivers at all, no we're not born to be free, we're just the layers of rock the river helps us to see. For millions of years our parents stratified this land and the river dug down to the very first man. The first thin little layer and then millions more, each one similar to the one after and before and with kids above and our parents below, there's hardly a change unless a mineral would grow. And then there's just a little bump, it's absorbed by the lines, packed into each other over history and time. Put your hands up and surrender. We're not great rivers, we're the lines on the cliff, the river decides how and when we exist. We're not the casters of nets or the fishers of men, we're not the builders of dams and we can't even swim. We're not the cliff jumping kids or fish swimming up stream, we're not free when we're free no we're not free when we dream. But we do get one choice, one chance to be free, some time in our lives the river helps us to see. And you can find it in faith, or birth or love or a girl. Your first chance to be free is a chance to surrender. Put your hands up and surrender.