Psychologist - Writer - MUSICIAN - Steve Bonham
Wide brimmed hat. Long dark coat. Guitar slung on back. 21 years on the road.
A 100,000 miles and half a thousand hotel rooms. From the Berlin Wall to Atlas
Mountains, from Sahara Desert to the streets of Hong Kong: a
memory brewed in the long simmering soup of people and place. A
man who has learned to watch and to listen, to walk and talk in
the ebb and flow of meeting and parting. He is a chronicler of
the human spirit in words. and music.
In the age of fake news, deceit, narcissistic posturing, climate change denial perhaps we need more
than ever the power of prayer. Not for me religious prayer but secular prayer. Words that remind us of our humanity, our connectedness, the indivisible bond that binds us, for, as the murdered politician Jo Cox so memorably said, “We have far more in common than that which divides us’
Prayer? It may seem an awkward word and I am sure phrases like ‘protest song’ sit more easily.
But prayers ultimately are about establishing rapport between an individual and something
precious and greater than themselves. A song like ‘Forever Young’ by Bob Dylan is a great example of this, words of hope and love for his son yet universal its embrace of fatherhood everywhere.
I have been trying to create a lyric as a prayer. I cannot say how successful it is yet, I am still working on it. But here it is in its first wobbly steps.
.
Do you laugh at the wind or cry in the night
Or do you sleep like a baby when you turn out the light
Do you go to the seashore where the ice cuts the air,
From the edge of the cliff top, do you fly, do you dare?
Do you shut the cracked window, when the last birds have gone,
Do you imagine the whole world , is breathing as one,
Do you open your eyes wide, when day and dusk meets?
Do you shiver with pleasure, at the touch of cool sheets
Do you stretch out a hand to the touch of a flower,
Do you remember the soft days, when life fades with the hours,
Do you lie awake thinking of all that you planned,
Do you forgive those that curse you, and hate where you stand?
Do you remember the heartbreak, the failure the fool,
The smell and the strange ways of your first day at school,
Do you think of the young boy, in worn shoes and shorts,
Falling from treetops, as he hopes to get caught?
Do you hold to the truth, like a flame in your heart,
When the whole earth falls silent do you know where to start?
Like a hurricane of hope, do you let each day in,
Do you still keep on singing, though you know you can’t win?
© Steve Bonham 2019
Thoughts for Jo Cox
Recorded at the Harrison ,
King Cross, London - this is Steve Bonham with excerpts from his
'The Song and The Story show'
Do You