pick me up

I first started writing the lyrics for this song in the year after my Dad passed away. It has only been in the last couple of weeks that I tweaked the melody and found a new pattern of phrasing that stuck. I also changed the words, making it a song more about grappling with eco anxiety as opposed to the grief of losing a loved one.

Here’s an excerpt of the words that I originally wrote: 

Spring arrives, it brings a mix of many things, hope and melancholy. There’s no way to separate joy from the loss. The spark of new beginnings comes at a cost.

The passing of my Dad in 2018 was the most significant loss and grief I have experienced. To have someone that’s been a key part of my life – my whole life - suddenly to be absent, has for me been an experience of reluctant recalibration. Dad passed away in November 2018 and when spring of 2019 came around enough time had passed for me to fully realise his absence and I didn’t want to get used to it, I didn’t want it to be ok. His birthday in September 2019, the first after his passing, a time of spring and new beginnings, made his absence even more present.

The new lyrics are about how we – amid the constant news and worries of floods, fires, extreme weather events, and rising tides – can find respite. Respite that is important so that we can then turn up to face these changing, uncertain times.

Pick me up

Carry me away

Take me to a place

Where I can be

Somewhere in between

Awake and sleep

Stormy skies, between

Rising tides

Flood and fire

Oh let me rest a while 

Day arrives

Bringing a mix of many feelings

Of hope

And uncertainty

Stormy skies, between

Rising tides

Flood and fire

Oh let me rest

Hope and grief, between

Anger and disbelief

Joy, dismay

Oh let me rest today

There’s no way

To separate

The joy

From the heartache