“Folk Singer” — Photo-Artistry by kenne
Who’s Gonna Build Your Wall? by Tom Russell on His Album Wounded Heart of America (2007)
“Maybe it’s not about happy ending.
Maybe it’s about the story.”
— Albert Camus
Archive for the ‘Tom Russell’ Tag
Folk Singer Leave a comment
“She Liberated Me To Life” 2 comments
Photo-Artistry by kenne (Early 2000’s In The Woodlands, Texas))
Look how far we’ve come
Do we know who we are?
Stranded on a mountaintop
Trying to catch a falling star
Here’s to what we’ve left behind us
Here’s to what we keep inside
May the road that lies before us
Lead to a place where love abides.
— from Love Abides by Tom Russell
Share this:
A Solute To The Common Man Leave a comment
“The Common Man” — Photo-Artistry by kenne
Poetry and Music Soluting The Common Man.
Julian Tuwim’s poem nails it.
In my younger days,
I worked with many a Harlan Clancy —
Tom Russell writes and sings
about in the album “Folk Hotel,”
referencing Aaron Copland’s anthem,
“Fanfare for the Common Man.”
In those early days,
the winters could be harsh,
and having spent many
a Christmas in the cold north,
I end this trilogy to The Common Man
with Merle Haggard,
“If We Make It Through December.”
— kenne
The Common Man
When plastered billboards scream with slogans
‘fight for your country, go to battle’
When media’s print assaults your senses,
‘Support our leaders’ shrieks and rattles…
And fools who don’t know any better
Believe the old, eternal lie
That we must march and shoot and kill
Murder, and burn, and bomb, and grill…
When press begins the battle-cry
That nation needs to unify
And for your country you must die…
Dear brainwashed friend, my neighbor dear
Brother from this, or other nation
Know that the cries of anger, fear,
Are nothing but manipulation
by fat-cats, kings who covet riches,
And feed off your sweat and blood – the leeches!
When call to arms engulfs the land
It means that somewhere oil was found,
Shooting ‘blackgold’ from underground!
It means they found a sneaky way
To make more money, grab more gold
But this is not what you are told!
Don’t spill your blood for bucks or oil
Break, burn your rifle, shout: ‘NO DEAL!’
Let the rich scoundrels, kings, and bankers
Send their own children to get killed!
May your loud voice be amplified
By roar of other common men
The battle-weary of all nations:
WE WON’T BE CONNED TO WAR AGAIN!
— Julian Tuwim
Tim Russell writes, Harlan Clancy
“. . . out there in the middle of Ohio,
a place you’ll never likely go . . .
Euro tourists never make it there . . .
the America of the shit jobs, farms,
remote ranches, wrecking yards,
inner-city brothels, shooting galleries,
used car lots, and back street bars that
still have Narco corridos, or Otis Redding,
or George Jones on the jukebox.”
Share this:
Desert Scene Painting Leave a comment
“Desert Scene” — Photo-Artistry by kenne
“The sky above, the mud below
The wind and rain, the sleet and snow
Two horse thieves from Mexico
Drinkin’ hard and singin'”
— from “The Sky Above, The Mud Below” by Tom Russell
Share this:
Blue Wing — Might Have Been A Bluebird 7 comments
Western Bluebird — Image by kenne
I can’t think of bluebirds without thinking of Tom Russell’s song, “Blue Wing” — one of my favorite. Both help me see the sky above.
— kenne
Blue Wing by Tom Russell
He had a blue wing tattooed on his shoulder
Well it might have been a bluebird I don’t know
But he’d get stone drunk and talk about Alaska
The salmon boats and 45 below
He said he got that blue wing up in Walla Walla
And his cellmate there was Little Willy John
And Willy he was once a great blues singer
And Wing and Willy wrote ’em up a song. They said…
CHORUS:
It’s dark in here; can’t see the sky
But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
And I fly away beyond these walls
Up above the clouds where the rain don’t fall
On a poor man’s dream.
They paroled Blue Wing in August, of 1963
He moved north picking apples to the town of Wenatchee
Then winter finally caught him in a run down trailer park
On the south side of Seattle where the days grow gray and dark
And he drank and he dreamt of visions when the salmon still ran free
And his fathers’ fathers crossed that wild old Bering Sea
And the land belonged to everyone and there were old songs yet to sing
Now it’s narrowed down to a cheap hotel and a tattooed prison wing
CHORUS:
It’s dark in here; can’t see the sky
But I look at this blue wing and I close my eyes
And I fly away beyond these walls
Up above the clouds where the rain don’t fall
On a poor man’s dream.
Blue Wing by Tom Russel Video
Share this:
Coyote Fence — Computer Painting Leave a comment
Computer Painting by kenne
You ask me what’s a coyote fence? A crooked line of cedar poles
Surrounding our adobe, our refuge from the road
Some nights we can see light of fires as Indians dance
And the eyes of God shine through the coyote fence.
— from “The Light Beyond the Coyote Fence” by Tom Russell
Share this:
An Old Red-clay Boy 2 comments
“On The Roads Outside Of San Diego”
On the roads outside Oshiobo,
I fell down on my knees
There were female spirits
In old mud huts, iron bells
Ringing up in the trees and
An eighty-year white priestess,
Who made juju all night long
East of Woodstock,
West of Viet Nam.
— from “East of Woodstock, West of Viet Nam” by Tom Russell
