09) Face to the Wind (FINALE)

Posted by Angela Josephine Category: Stories-and-Lyrics

My Story

‘Face to the Wind’, the final song of this album, is not a song of answers, but rather one of reconciliation. It is a personal invitation – an invitation to all – to ‘taste the bread and the wine’, to engage in holy communion with life. It is a call to the redemptive process.

Throughout my own life, but especially in the last 7 years of my journey, I have resisted the path of the struggle. This resistance most often has to do with fear.  Fear of being vulnerable. Fear of the unknown. Fear of failure.  Struggle, pain, and challenge run tandem with joy, growth and fulfillment. To turn away is to reject it all. To face it is to find myself.  I connect with those around me, I live into my truth and join the redemptive process. I find my soul.

My EP, Stone Bright Solid – Volume 1, was the first step in the journey to explore the dark night. The title song from that album is about being ‘caught’ in the net of darkness and distracted by anything that glimmers with hope. All the while, the Stone Bright Solid true hope is a witness and a midwife to this difficult experience. She cradles us and weeps over our broken attempts, all the while waiting patiently for our awakening.

‘Face to the Wind (Finale)’ ends with a reprise of the song ‘Stone Bright Solid’ on cello and hammered dulcimer. This reprise of ‘Stone Bright Solid’ signals an emergence in awareness, in complete understanding of our brokenness but standing singularly in its raw form as a statement of acceptance to all the life found in our darkness on the road to hope and joy.

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Folk Rock Opera

In terms of the narrative arc, this is the end of the story for the woman, but it is also the beginning. The beginning of new process of struggle and joy, never ending, always different, always the same.

 

 

Face to the Wind (FINALE)

by angela josephine

 

take a walk with me

tell me what you see

be my eyes, be my ears

i am feeling so blind

take a walk with me

tell me what you see

trace my face with your lips

i am feeling so numb

i’m coming undone

i can’t take

no i can’t take it

you turn my face to the wind

you say, “breathe it all in,

open wide”

you tell me, “take it all in,

wear the sky on your skin

and the birds will fly to you”

you surround me

you, you surround me

take a walk with me

tell me what you see

be my salt, be my light

i am feeling so blind

take a walk with me

tell me what you see

trace my face with your lips

taste the bread and the wine

but i can’t cross that line

and i can’t take

no i can’t take it

but you turn my face to the wind

you say, “breathe it all in,

open wide”

you tell me, “take it all in,

wear the sky on your skin

and the birds will fly to you”

you surround me

you, you surround me

i’m taking the cross in this way

there’s no other way

no other way

you’ve taken away my attack

there’s no turning back

no turning back

when you, you surround me

you, you surround me

fly

the birds will fly

fly to you

fly

the birds will fly

fly to you

fly

fly

…Stone Bright Solid (Reprise)

Enter the experience…

What is calling to you? What fear do you need to lean into? What is your holy now? Go forward into new experience. Turn your face to the wind and breathe in the life that is yours.