"For the Ages" by Nappy Martin MENDING NEWS: "The signature of a great love is a tiny remnant that quietly warms and nourishes a corner of the heart unreached before or since." I am a strong believer in asserting the influence not only of artists whose music I loved but also whose songs I loved by. At the time recalled in this unabashed tribute, my Soul ear was trained on a Philadelphia trio called The Delfonics. What better way to launch it than with their signature drum start. A still-closed bridge, rushing water, the feeling has never changed. But on this day a June "snowstorm" of dandelion seeds gave me just the right visual incongruity to accompany the emotional component. Though the view behind me is the real deal, I chickened out and photoshopped it. Gotta love the chroma key effect on the capo, even if it does give my guitar a pane in the neck! Words and music by Nappy Martin. Video recorded on the Cottage Street Bridge, Great Barrington, MA, and the nearby Ferrous Fortress; audio at latter site. Guitar, Vocals, arrangement by Nappy Martin. Copyright 1996 ryeside music (BMI). Lyrics: a smile, when fond remembered can perpetuate the light that so faithfully illuminates one's way and of yours it can be said, that a flame was resurrected when i heard it in your laugh the other day though the miles have long since rendered your affections dim and slight how the power of sweet constancy remains for our plans may have diverged, at a time of lesser urgency but now we see the frailty of our gains for what is a life but a phrase now filling pages woven through chapters of the heart that play as one and if the wealth of tears and laughs, dwells in a single paragraph scribed above, it's a love for the ages the best i might remember, is the worst i could forget of a child i can't relate to anymore and of you i'd say the same, though i really couldn't blame you for the time i watched you fading from my door as our chance return engagement takes an old familiar turn toward the wayward same directions of our prime though we still must say goodbye, now at least we say it eye to eye and find we've made the better of the time for what is to love but to turn the flaming pages knowing the words thereon may singe but never burn and if the warmest of laments, swells from a fire still unspent that's enough, it's a love for the ages that's enough, it's a love for the ages... (wasn't it a breeze, flirting so innocently?) (weren't we as free, as we could venture to be?) (wouldn't you agree, this time definitively?) That's enough, it's a love for the ages!
