A happy, rather whimsical, autobiographical folk song about my allotment in Derby, UK!
Lyrics and production: Somhairle Kelly
Music, vocals and ukulele: Elly Hadaway
|
This is the second track on my 2015 EP, "Tell Me Where the Ocean Went", and the most autobiographical of the set.
Everything in it that isn't obviously hyperbolical is true, up to and including our tendency to put flowers in each other's hair! The allotment has been many things to us over the past year, but not least a regular, life-affirming space in which to connect with the earth, learn skills that matter to us, get a bit of surprisingly fresh air into our lungs, and bring home something pretty and/or tasty at the end of the day. It's also important to us that our house and our allotment were established at the same time, as part of the same initiative at the end of the 19th century, providing terraced houses and allotments for the workers at the (now derelict) tape factory down the road. The sense of continuity is precious, and having this land to cultivate and supplement our diet serves a similar purpose for us (as disabled self-employed types on a low income) as it must have done for the original factory workers and their families. It's also blessedly good land - originally farmland, as far as we can tell, and likely never built on. Some of the scraps of pottery we've found were probably originally thrown away by the farmers, given their likely age!
Somhairle wrote the words to be specifically from my point of view, hence the reference to me carrying a billhook across my lap - we transported it from our house to the allotment with me using my wheelchair, and with the billhook supported across me. (I have also carried LARP swords to playreadings in a similar manner. ;-) ) A few lines in the final two verses are actually by both of us jointly. :-)
Writing the music for this one took a while longer than average. The first half of the verse tune came swiftly, the second half rather less so, and then the chorus took several days to settle into its present form. It was worth every minute, though - I'm deeply fond of this song. :-)
|
1. The trees are gnarled and gentle,
The grass is long and fair,
A hundred years of workers
Fed their hungry families here.
We're finding flowers in corners,
The grass is full of light,
And in this dark and breathing soil
We'll see our crops come right.
Chorus. Food to eat and food to keep,
And plenty yet to give away,
The earth is always generous here,
And beautiful as day.
2. We took the iron to the land,
A bill-hook 'cross my lap,
With fork and spade and secateurs,
We fixed two years' mishap.
We found panes for the greenhouse,
And nettles everywhere,
We pulled five thousand dandelions,
Threaded speedwell in our hair.
3. We bared the living soil,
Trimmed back the briar and bind,
We wove the willow, laid the thorn,
And cut the bramble-wynd.
The earth breeds scraps of porcelain,
Grown from someone's planting pot:
Willow-pattern, fifties flowers,
And old forget-me-not.
4. We're digging up potatoes
Eating raspberries from the cane
Picking poppies in the sunshine
Peas and strawberries in the rain
The plum-tree's dark and heavy
Fruit enough the branches break
We're making staves, and jars of jam
And there's crumble still to bake.
5. The soil will be our mentor
As our knowledge slowly grows
We'll move our squashes late next year,
Plant the carrots all in rows.
Here we'll grow our food and flowers
Just like hundreds did before
Earth this good is earth well-tended
Earth that loves and feeds us all.
x |
|
 |
|