Karine Polwart - We're All Leaving. Darwin Song Project 2009

Shrewsbury Folk Festival's Darwin Song Project
We're All Leaving
written by Karine Polwart & Dave Gunning
performed by Karine Polwart & Jez Lowe
Darwin Song Project Concert
Shrewsbury, March 19th 2009
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In March 2009 eight folk singer/songwriters gathered together for a week long songwriting residential in rural Shropshire to create songs that had a relevance and resonance with Charles Darwin.
The eight artists were Chris Wood, Karine Polwart, Stu Hanna, Rachael McShane, Krista Detor, Emily Smith, Mark Erelli and Jez Lowe.
The whole concert was recorded for a CD release, and the 8 musicians reconvened at the Shrewsbury Folk Festival in August, to once again perform the 19 songs that were written during the week.
Details on the project
www.darwinsongproject.com
Details of the festival at
www.shrewsburyfolkfestival.co.uk
Sound mixed by Stu Hanna
Video recorded and edited by Microvideo, Shrewsbury
Lyrics
There is thunder on the skyline
And it tears her breath away
Like the twilight steals the day
A father's kind hand could not command her
To return to him once more
Like a soldier from the war
We're all leaving
Even the ones who stay behind
We're all leaving in our own time
We're all leaving in our own time
Each night surrenders to a morning
But beneath the April sky
He can hear an endless cry
On smiling fields there's a battle raging
And for every bloom he knows
Another flower never grows
We're all leaving ...
And he has no Ark to bear him from this Flood
Just a broken vessel wrought in flesh and blood
Though the riptides pull him under
He will not cease to wonder
At the beauty, beauty, beauty, beauty
He brings her mother to the church door
And while she prays for what will come
He walks those woods alone
And there he builds his own cathedrals
And on every whirring wing
He can hear the whole world sing
We're all leaving ...