Love is a Tanglewood Tree

I can't put my little Valentine series to bed without a song from what is perhaps my favorite musical couple. Now separated by death, they still touch the world with their songs, and she continues on in her path in the retelling of songs and rediscovery of herself without her life and musical partner.

The work of Tracy Grammer and Dave Carter grabbed me about five years ago -- when my own mind was starting to turn back to music and to the condition of my life -- and hasn't ever let go. I was late in discovering them, just a bit too late. A friend had shared with me the story of Dave Carter's untimely death following an afternoon run, just before the Falcon Ridge Folk Festival. Suddenly the world was without this voice with so many songs unwritten and unsung. And Tracy Grammer was without the gentle soldier of her soul.

Tracy is continuing on in her work, sharing her own interpretations of his songs, other songs, and her own songs. And she also bears his legacy proudly. Dave Carter was a troubadour in every sense of the word, an American balladeer folk hero in the making, a poet, a prophet, a voice unlike any other.

I love the songs of David Carter, who chose Tracy to be their voice. I love listening to them together. I hope someday I can raise my voice alongside a musical partner in some of these songs.

Their songs about love were never simple or uncomplicated. Like life, real human love

can be complicated. It's not the low-hanging fruit, but the more ripe and full delicacy up six or seven limbs and beyond a few spiny thorns that may extend and retract without warning.

Tanglewood Tree is the title track from their second release. It speaks to the need for authenticity in love, not the fluffy pink stuff of the Hallmark holiday, but the rich fertile fecund stuff out of which grows our better nature. This clip gives you a good long taste beginning at the bridge, and illustrates how the last verse goes with the double-lyric.

May you find yourself caught in the sweet tanglewood tree of things not simple, but real.

Tanglewood Tree

love is a tanglewood tree in a bower of green

in a forest at dawn

fair while the mockingbird sings, but she soon lifts her wings

and the music is gone

young lovers in the tall grass with their hearts open wide

when the red summer poppies bloom

but love is a trackless domain and the rumor of rain in the late afternoon

love is an old root that creeps through the meadows of sleep

when the long shadows cast

thin as a vagrant young vine, it encircles and twines

and it holds the heart fast

catches dreamers in the wildwood with the stars in their eyes

and the moon in their tousled hair

but love is a light in the sky, and an unspoken lie

and a half-whispered prayer

i'm walkin' down a bone-dry river but the cool mirage runs true

i'm bankin' on the fables of the far, far better things we do

i'm livin' for the day of reck'nin countin' down the hours

i yearn away, i burn away, i turn away the fairest flower of love, 'cause darlin . . .

love is a garden of thorns, and a crow in the corn

and the brake growing wild

cold when the summer is spent in the jade heart's lament

for the faith of a child

my body has a number and my face has a name

and each day looks the same to me

but love is a voice on the wind, and the wages of sin

and a tanglewood tree

(Sung alongside the last verse, above)

love's garden of thorns, how it grows

black crow in the corn hummin' low

brake nettle so pretty and wild

and thistles surround the edge of the

dim dark hour as the sun moves away

lamenting a lost summer day

who nurtures the faith of a child

when nothing remains to cover her eyes?

my body has a number, maybe my face has a name

each hour like each hour before

this longing is a voice on the wind

she cultivates the wages of sin

in a tanglewood tree