Album: "Hard Rope & Silken Twine" (1974)
As I beside some winter's fire,
sat writing words strange and steady;
amongst my own internal choir
came voices to my mind unready.
Of those who died on either side,
while friends cry o'er their bones unburied;
go sighing through the North east wind,
these cold days of February.
Some clerk with papers and his pen;
some banker with his poison pity;
some Captain careless of his men.
These fan the flames that maim the cities.
And bigots in the name of Christ,
by thorny paths obscure and muddy,
can fear to roam through years of cold;
bewailing how their hands are bloody.
Now whether they were from here or there;
their race and place I would not be heeding.
The men who caused such bitterness -
If hearts they have -
Let their hearts be bleeding -
who neither for age nor the young child,
would turn the shot of the arms they carried.
Go bear the guilt a weary ways;
for the cold days of February
sat writing words strange and steady;
amongst my own internal choir
came voices to my mind unready.
Of those who died on either side,
while friends cry o'er their bones unburied;
go sighing through the North east wind,
these cold days of February.
Some clerk with papers and his pen;
some banker with his poison pity;
some Captain careless of his men.
These fan the flames that maim the cities.
And bigots in the name of Christ,
by thorny paths obscure and muddy,
can fear to roam through years of cold;
bewailing how their hands are bloody.
Now whether they were from here or there;
their race and place I would not be heeding.
The men who caused such bitterness -
If hearts they have -
Let their hearts be bleeding -
who neither for age nor the young child,
would turn the shot of the arms they carried.
Go bear the guilt a weary ways;
for the cold days of February
×
![]()
