Post by Deleted on May 20, 2016 13:10:57 GMT -5
I really don't write that many songs about my own life. I've written a few, but maybe I've just been to too many open mics and heard too many whiny, angst-soaked singer-songwriters sing on and on about their broken heart or some other problem they feel the need to tell us about. All in all, I've had a good (albeit sometimes-bumpy) life, so who wants to hear my problems? Besides, it is more fun to write about others.
This song is an exception. I wrote it last year after some of the thoughts about my brother's death finally digested and settled. For those unfamiliar, my only brother, John, 10 years my senior, died a couple of months before we moved to the Middle East in 2014. He was diagnosed with a particularly virulent and aggressive form of renal cancer; he was dead a month after the diagnosis.
John was a professor emeritus in the Texas A&M system and at a memorial they had for him on the campus in Commerce, I was stunned by the people who came out. He helped so many people in his career, and it was a career spent in the pursuit of truth, knowledge and service. We buried him in a cemetery just west of our hometown of Casey.
Since I don't write very many personal songs, I'm not always sure how much to reveal of my own thoughts and feelings. That's probably a weird thing for a songwriter to say. But, anyway, when my thoughts settled, I sat down and wrote this.
Town of Faded Signs
© 2016 by David Hanners
Head down Central, left on Main
Hang a right and it's straight ahead
What was once a smart two-story stucco
Now sits lonely as an unmade bed
This white house is what you left
More years ago than I care to count
You have returned, my only brother
So much to say but you are not around
Always swore I should get to know you better
Some excuse kept us apart
Blame the years between us, blame the miles
Truth is, it was my fault
Off Route 40 lies a country cemetery
Shaded by persimmon and elm trees
Tombstones adrift on a sea of our ancestry
You are home now, says a sympathetic breeze
To Creation we belong, to Creation we return
Faith that logic undermines
Fare thee well, I will bear my regrets
Down Main Street of this town of faded signs
'Til we meet again, I will bear my regrets
Down Main Street of this town of faded signs
This song is an exception. I wrote it last year after some of the thoughts about my brother's death finally digested and settled. For those unfamiliar, my only brother, John, 10 years my senior, died a couple of months before we moved to the Middle East in 2014. He was diagnosed with a particularly virulent and aggressive form of renal cancer; he was dead a month after the diagnosis.
John was a professor emeritus in the Texas A&M system and at a memorial they had for him on the campus in Commerce, I was stunned by the people who came out. He helped so many people in his career, and it was a career spent in the pursuit of truth, knowledge and service. We buried him in a cemetery just west of our hometown of Casey.
Since I don't write very many personal songs, I'm not always sure how much to reveal of my own thoughts and feelings. That's probably a weird thing for a songwriter to say. But, anyway, when my thoughts settled, I sat down and wrote this.
Town of Faded Signs
© 2016 by David Hanners
Head down Central, left on Main
Hang a right and it's straight ahead
What was once a smart two-story stucco
Now sits lonely as an unmade bed
This white house is what you left
More years ago than I care to count
You have returned, my only brother
So much to say but you are not around
Always swore I should get to know you better
Some excuse kept us apart
Blame the years between us, blame the miles
Truth is, it was my fault
Off Route 40 lies a country cemetery
Shaded by persimmon and elm trees
Tombstones adrift on a sea of our ancestry
You are home now, says a sympathetic breeze
To Creation we belong, to Creation we return
Faith that logic undermines
Fare thee well, I will bear my regrets
Down Main Street of this town of faded signs
'Til we meet again, I will bear my regrets
Down Main Street of this town of faded signs