Notes on "Every Turn of the Sky"
Tony Turner and Trevor Mills started this when they asked people to write songs on "North" for an Ontario Council of Folk Festivals conference happening in North Bay. It was a contest, I recall.
Love a challenge. I tried to capture my own experience of the north, rather than trees and rocks and rocks and trees. Though actually I've never been that far north really, so to someone from Nunavut this would seem to be about the south.
I got this ready in few days. I'm specially fond of the guitar part, but I should probably change a few of the words ... though I like the line "the love of this hard hard land that does not suffer fools". If I rewrote I would keep that ...
Every Turn of the Sky
Words and Music © David Keeble, Sept 11, 2003 Chorus:For we have stood by the still black lake, and heard the loon’s wild cry,
and have traveled through rapids and rocks, and pine-tangled pools,
and have learned the love of this hard hard land that does not suffer fools,
and have breathed its sprit with every turn of the sky.
These northern lakes can be cold in the summer though the rain falls warm and slow
as we shelter beneath the boughs and feel the fire burn,
But the morning breaks so calm and quiet that we cannot bear to go,
And it tells us ,without any words, that we will return.
Chorus
It's a long drive south through towns and cities and the ways that people live,
to the days filled up with details that we must learn.
But sometimes, when we're lost in the chatter, there's a moment silence gives,
And it tells us, without any words, that we will return.
Chorus