Green Man Lyrics

The Green Man Em
Em
My face in the foliage, you’ve seen that face before
Em
It was carved in the Choir by your fathers back in days of yore
Am Em
I’m the power in the pulse I’m the song underneath the soil
Bm Am Em
I’m the unseen King of the ditches, ragged and royal
C D Em (G harmonics)
I’m the Green Man, don’t take my name in vain
C D Em (G harmonics)
I’m the Green Man, and its time to break my chain
C D Em
If you cut me down I’ll spring back green again

I’m the roots on the stock I’m the tender shoots on the vine
I’m the goodness in the bread I’m the wildness in the wine
There’s power in the place where my smallest tendrils are curled
And my softest touch is the strongest thing in the world

I’m the Green Man, don’t take my name in vain
I’m the Green Man, I’m bound to break my chain
If you cut me down I’ll spring back green again

I’m the grass at your feet and the leaves that shade your head
I’ll be your bower of love, I’l be your green grass bed
I’m in the finest flower, I’m the power in the wickedest weed
And I’ll plough your furrow with pleasure and plant my seed

I’m the Green Man, and I make love with the rain
I’m the Green Man, and I feel like breaking my chain
You might think I’m finished but I’ll spring back up again

You can cover me in concrete, staple me down with steel
Spread your houses and your car parks over my fields
But I’ll still be there keeping everything alive
And I’ll spring back green but you might not survive

I’m the Green Man, don’t take my name in vain
I’m the Green Man, Its time to break my chain
You can cut me down but I’ll spring back green again
©Malcolm Guite 2002

Angels Unawares
Angels Unawares C

C G C
Some people say that life is just a given thing
F G C
but you and I both know by whom its lent
F G
and that its right here in the dirt
C F
where we’ve both been loved and hurt
Dm G
that Love Himself has come to pitch His tent
C G C
sometimes we’re in the fields of holy roses
F G C
other times we’re rolling in the tares
F G
breaking bread and sharing wine
C F
did I feel your hand touch mine
Dm G
or did we both touch angels unawares?

Abraham’s down by the oaks of Mamre
and Joseph dreams beside an empty barn
theres a woman by the well with dreams no man can tell
though a broken man might keep her safe from harm
Theres someone else inside this fiery furnace
and Jacob’s gazing up those endless stairs
we are wounded on the road, but we share each others load,
and make each other angels unawares

Everybody backs into the future
everyone’s just feeling for it blind
sometimes we get lost and the threads of our lives get crossed
but I’m sure glad yours got tangled up with mine
the day is gone and I know I should be going
theres barely light enough to say our prayers
ah but give me leave the while for to turn and see you smile
and leave to love like angels unawares
and leave to love like angels unawares

Goldentop Guitar

He’s not so young but he’s not so Old
and he doesn’t look back to an age of gold
He says find what your lookin for right here where you are
with you rock-bottom heart and my golden-top Guitar

He says if life was a test then no-one would pass
I got a few years left, I’m gonna kick some ass
I’m gonna get you rockin no matter who you are
When I hit the stage with my golden top guitar
BR
Now its battered in places and the golds worn thin
and the finish is frazzled where the sweats worn in
But we’ve all got a story for every single scar
And he tells you yours through his Golden top guitar

There’s people ou there who live like they’re dead
and drag themselves around like they were made of lead
till they meet the alchemist, rockin in their local bar
turning lead into gold with his golden top guitar

Well he’s been hurt and he’s paid his dues
and he sure knows how to spit out the blues
he’s got music in his soul he’s got whisky in the jar
he’s got tunes that’ll heal you in his golden top guitar
BR
Well he’s nothing to look at, he’s nothing to see
he’s never gonna make it on MTV
And he knows too much to even dream about being a star
but he can lift your heart with his golden top guitar

He’s not so young but he’s not so Old
and he doesn’t look back to an age of gold
He says find what your lookin for right here where you are
with you rock-bottom heart and my golden-top Guitar

Sometimes

Sometimes
C Am
Sometimes, oh sometimes
G G7 C
I seem to feel you take me by the hand
C Am
Softly I hear you whisper
G G7 C
Those simple words I still don’t understand
F
Sometimes it seems we walk alone
C
Beside the river bed
Am
And I can hear the nightingale
G C
Reminding me of words I never said.
F
I wonder if this midnight wind
C
That robs me of my sleep
Am G
Disturbs the sleep of someone who has sown
G C
And left the wind to reap
G
Who has sown,
G7 C
And left the wind to reap.

© Malcolm Guite 2006

Try for the Son
C G C
Now I don’t mind a bargain but you want to own the whole store
C G C
You say that life is a game and money is how they keep score
C C7
So your selling your time for the highest bids
F
everyones a winner (except for your kids)
C G C
You think I want less than you believe me brother I want more
Cho:
G C
You want the world,I want the one who made it
G C
You want the song I want the one who played it
C C7
So you take the many, I’ll take the one
F
you can add to your collection, it’ll never be done
C G C
you can cry for the moon, but I’m gonna try for the Son

You want bars on your gate post, golden letters on your door
you got notches on your bedpost, you cant remember who they’re for
you remember a girl with glimmering eyes,
you cant remember which of you was wearing the disguise
you think I want less than you believe me brother I want more
Cho
You want the surface I want the depth behind it
you want to flirt with truth, I want to go out and find it
So you take the many, I’ll take the one
you can add to your collection, til your comfortablu numb
you can cry for the moon, but I’m gonna try for the Son

You want your numbers to come up in the lottery draw
you want to pretend that you’ll never be helpless or poor
you want promotion, status and power,
you want the rest of us to grovel and cower
you think I want less then you but all the time I want more
Cho
You want the swimming pool I want the source of the river
you want the life-style I want to meet the life giver
So you take the many, I’ll take the one
you cant take your collections into Kingdom come
you can cry for the moon, but I’m gonna try for the Son

©Malcolm Guite2001

Ragged Light

I can make a bonfire of our vanity
But I can’t smoke out your memory
something still burns at the heart of that fire
you walk towards me through the ghosts of desire

you change like an angel on the edge of my sight
the gift of your love was just a trick of the light
I can still feel your touch in the shimmering rain
I’d rather be buried than feel that again

Bridge: I brought you everything I believed in
You said the god had long withdrawn
you turned to love me in the ragged light of the evening
but I loved you in the whisky light of dawn

we walked together to the very edge
and kicked aside the last minute bridge
for all the years we’ve both fallen through
I still tremble on that brink with you

You can tone down the colours and fade them to grey
you can move to the borders where time fades away
you can bury the feelings you can scrub out the stain
in the blink of an eye its all vivid again

Bridge: hidden hearts still call out to each other
but when you fall theres no return
If I should ever learn to call you my lover
do believe my tongue would burn

I brought you everything I believed in
only to find the God withdrawn
I let you love me in the ragged light of the evening
and leave me in the whisky light of dawn
©Malcolm Guite 2006

Empty Things

When I woke up this mornin
My mind was really messed
I didn’t even try to move my head
The darkness all around me
Was full of emptiness
Empty bottles, empty heart, empty bed

Br:
Now there something missing here
Is it something I should know
Is it someone who once loved me
So she said
Well I’ve emptied out my memory
And still it won’t let go
So I emptied out these bottles here instead

When she comes round to pack her things
She’ll say whats done is done
And I’ll be undone by things
That cant be said
SoI’ll unpack my empty things
And count them one by one
Empty bottles, empty heart, empty bed.

Our Lady of the Highways

E

Pray for the loser who’s a daydream winner
Pray for the angel who’s a hopeless sinner
For the long lost pilgrim stuck on some sad byway
Pray, our lady of the highway

Pray for the hitchers in the freezing rain
Pray for the junkie on a bad road again
For the death-row walker, pacing out his long good Friday
Pray, our lady of the highway

BR: cos you know how to carry a load like them
You travelled the long hard road from Bethlehem,
To the foot of the cross and beyond you took your way
Pray for us now, our lady of the highway.

Pray for the biker on a dangerous bend
For the broken down rocker at his journeys end
And for this bluesman with no strength left to play
Pray, our lady of the highway

Pray for the drunkard drinking his last wine
Pray for the fool who thinks of crossing that line,
For the runaway children when theres no place left to stay
Pray, our lady of the highway

BR:Cos you say that God lets the hungry eat
You say he kicks the mighty right out of their seat
The rich and satisfied he sends empty away
So pray for us all our lady of the highway

Pray for the minds that were mangled in the fight
Pray for the refugees running in the night
And for the families packed in the back of those trucks all day
Pray, our lady of the highway

Pray for the traveller taking his last breath
Pray for us now and in the hour of our death
Pray for us all as the last light fades away
Pray, our lady of the highway

BR:Your Son came to carry a load like ours
To open a road that climbs beyond the shining stars
That he may walk with us to the end of that way
Pray, our lady of the highway

Get yourself together

You say “get yourself together”
but its easier said than done
I don’t want to stall but I still can’t recall
Where half of me is coming from

I left my mind in Canada, round 1979
I can still see that rose in the Manitoba snows
And a love that got frozen in time
And part of me’s still busking in the London underground
Theres echoes of my soul in that ragged black hole
like love-letters in the lost and found

You say “get yourself together”
I only wish I could
but part of me yearns to the pale moon that burns
above a child in a midnight wood

Br:
and part of me is still by the Liffey-side
in a smoky Dublin Bar
where the fiddles still play and the bodies still sway
and the moth still longs for the star
and part of me stands at the end of the pier
where the ships all sail so free
and the wind in my face will never erase
the word she gave to me

“get yourself together”
but its easier said than done
I don’t want to stall but I still cant recall
where half of me is coming from

Br:
My heart’s still out there somewhere
Although it might seem lost
and it’ll come home complete when all broken hearts meet
on the opposite arms of the cross

I will get myself together
its only a question of when
when the dead all arise
when God opens my eyes
I might get it together by then

New TV

You got a brand new Berghaus Jacket, people would kill for your shoes
You got a house they might re-possess, you got a job you might lose
You got a video collection, with titles that the Law should never see
But no matter where you plug it in you can’t get any love from your new TV

You got the latest hi-tech hot-hatch, the payments are overdue,
You don’t talk to your patents, you think they might have forgotten you
Well you used to have a wife, but you know money always made you disagree
And no matter where you plug it in you can’t get any love from your new TV

Bridge: Well you’re dressed up like the adverts
You look hot for love in the latest designer jeans
But you traded in relationships
For people who use you and screw just like machines

There’s someone looking for you, he knows your hard to find
They say that when He made this world He still had you in mind
He stretched His arms to reach for you, He wants to make you new and set you free
But how can he get through to you if you just can’t unplug that new TV
He’d give you all His Father’s love if only you’d unplug that new TV
You got a new TV, You got a new TV etc.

How beautiful you are

C F C
You came to me with trouble in your eyes
C F G
I know you came for comfort and advice
F G C F
But I could see in your tomorrow. places where I’ve been
F G C F
and I could see the soul in sorrow shining through your skin
F G C F
and loves a flame flies from the marrow out to the furthest star
Dm G C
and I’m trying not to notice how beautiful you are

You came to tell a tale I surely knew
you hoped that I might find the words for you
but silence never seemed so rich nor bitterness so sweet
as in the breath of broken speech in words you won’t complete
And I have never come so close nor felt myself so far
as when I wished I could not see how beautiful you are

At length you spoke your brokenness and sighed
I trembled and I had to turn aside
How can I bear the light that falls in glory on your hair
or glimpse the hints of loveliness you scatter unaware
when just a glance cuts like a lance to the hurt beneath the scar
to touch the tenderness that knows how beautiful you are

F G C
Happiness dies by such and such
F G C F
I know our eyes should never meet, our lips should never touch
F G C F
I guess I had best turn my back and pick up my guitar
Dm G C
and only tell the empty room how beautiful you are.

Restless Heart

I’ve got somebody to wake me up
I’ve got somebody else to fill up my cup
I’ve got a whole team of people taking my mind apart,
I’ve got a man on the marketplace making my bids,
I’ve got a woman round the block looking after my kids
But I aint got nobody to rock my restless heart

Cho: Well its a a heart that’s been through too many changes,
Its my heart, but it feels just like a strangers,
Its my heart, but its worn
Into pieces and its being torn
Between a man on a cross, and a baby in a manger.

I’ve got somebody to fetch my pills
I’ve got a qualified doctor looking after my ills
I’ve got a plan for my life, but I knew it wouldn’t work from the start
I’ve got a nasty reputation for following trends,
Plenty of enemies, plenty of friends,
But I aint got nobody to rock my restless heart

©Malcolm Guite 2002

Open Door

Open Door
D Fsharpm G
You were floating in an open space nobody could touch you there
D Fsharpm G
I was living in another place of which you were unaware
Your mother cried out in the night your father walked the floor
And the wind was blowing across the stars when you came through an open door
D Fsharpm G

I’d been travelling for some time when we met by the flowing stream
By the time we reached the other side time itself was a dream
We could have wasted both our lives trying to find out what they’re for
The world was closed like a book to us but the heart was an open door

The stream has carried the years away and buried the heart with care
But I still see that other place and the two of us standing there
And if we met in this world again would it be like it was before
On one side there's an open grave, on the other there's an open door

I could have looked the other way, but I looked into your eyes
I can cover my trail and change my name but there's something I can’t disguise
The rich would like love to ride with them but he still walks with the poor
He can crawl all night past their palace walls but he stops at an open door

They say that Love was a vagrant once playing catch me if you can
Hiding his body in a loaf of bread and his godhead deep in a man
Everybody thinks they’ve heard his words or they’ve seen his face before
But just when they tried to close him down he turned into an open door

For some people life is a tragedy for some it’s a pantomime
Some people say that there's just no way to see beyond the stream of time
But you and I know better than that since we stood on the exile shore
Where other people saw only empty sky John showed us an open door

Now all around me people fall and they call each other to blame
But all I can hear is the echo of the time love called me by my name
Now I can’t read the signs of the times I don’t claim to know the score
Some say there's only a brick wall ahead but I see an open door

If you are ever in these parts you can always come my way
The river has run so deep so long there's nothing you need to say
You’ve heard that love is stronger than death but how can you be sure?
Well there's a fire burning on my hearth and you’ll still find an open door
©Malcolm Guite 2002

A Texas Farewell

I flew out of Houston
On a bright November day
Sunlight glanced on silver wings
And I was on my way.
Banked over Navasota
Where the people treat you kind
They put Texas underneath your feet
And Heaven on your mind.

Now Tammy took this Martin
And she put it in my hands
Said play a song for all of us
Lost in the shadowlands
Play it for the ones who leave
And the ones they leave behind
With Texas underneath their feet
And Heaven on their mind

So this one's for the child in you
Who glimpsed her heaven once
And this one's for the woman
Giving her a second chance,
This one's for Jack, who found his Joy
though ours is still to find,
With Texas underneath our feet
And Heaven on our mind.

I flew out of Houston
With my memories in a bag
And Texas spread below me
Like a star without a flag
The child in me can see a light
To which the man is blind,
Texas is dark below me now
But Heaven's on my mind.