Exchange

     One of my Internet buddies and I mail--not email, mind you, but actually mail--each other song lyrics that we think might work as poetry.  The catch is that we don't open the envelope until we are onstage at an open microphone.  He is Canadian so, naturally, I sent him these two:

"Cactus" by Ferron



"Famous Blue Raincoat" by Leonard Cohen

Buffy Ford Stewart and her husband, John

     Unaware that my friend was a fellow Bloodliner¹ , I was somewhat surprised--we[e] squirrels don't like surprises at the best of times and standing on a stage is not a good time for anyone to be taken off guard--when I opened my envelope and read the lyrics to John Stewart's "Strange Rivers", along with the suggestion to omit the last two stanzas "if only to meet the time limit":

There are voices in the mirror
And there are faces at the door
And they open on the rivers
We've never seen before
And are there choices for the Sparrow
Or does he only fly
High above the rivers
Pulling you and I?

There are strange rivers
Rivers that you can not see
And there are strange rivers
Who know our destiny
And there are strange rivers
And we're sailors
You and me

And he could have been a builder
He could have been the one
To turn his dreams to steel
Cathedrals in the sun
And he could have been a builder
But then he bought the gun
There are forces in that river
That keep him on the run

There are strange rivers
Rivers that you can not see
And there are strange rivers
Who know our destiny
And there are strange rivers
And we're sailors
You and me

Did you ever turn the corner
And you wondered why you did
'Cause you haven't been that way, now
Since you were just a kid
And nothing really happened
But then you've got to say
That you wonder what would've happened
Had you gone the other way
There are strange rivers
Rivers that you can not see
And there are strange rivers
Who know our destiny
And there are strange rivers
And we're sailors
You and me

For there are strange rivers
There are strange rivers
And there are strange rivers
There are strange rivers
Oh, there are strange rivers
There are strange rivers

Feel the river
See the river
Be the river

     I thought I'd done rather well until I saw this video:




     I  love  that voice!

     My only criticism is that the performer, one "Hank Beukema", anticipated the next line as he spoke and stopped at the end of unenjambed lines, making it sound too phrasal.  I certainly agreed with my buddy that, as a poem, it is better without the last two stanzas.

     Here is the song, performed by its author, John Stewart:

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Footnotes:

¹ - Since one of his earliest albums, "California Bloodlines", the term "Bloodliner" has referred to a John Stewart fan.

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