This is my song
The sound of bare feet on cobblestones
By the waterside
Fit to burst with pride
In a whirl, I feel at one with the world
Just a cry, no words
A note is heard
This is my song
She is a girl in a station in a border town
And she’s a thundercloud
I can hear it now
I can see the world is looking at me
I’m playing up to the crowd
Singing it long and loud
In a whirl
I feel at one with the world
Just a cry, no words
A note is heard
This is my song
I wrote this at my mother’s house in the summer between leaving Sheffield and moving to London. I played three minutes of tambourine onto a crappy old tape recorder, then improvised this whole thing on top. A few secrets revealed: the waterside in question is the banks of the river Nevern in Pembrokeshire, site of many a magical childhood holiday. And the girl in a station in a border town is my friend Liz Lalley. During the summer I recorded The Fire Stairs, I played at a festival in Monmouth, on the border between England and Wales. Liz came to the show and I felt the need to improvise a new second verse in her honour. It stuck. The noise at the end is the Llantrisant Male Voice Choir singing Myfanwy. They were recorded on my mobile phone in a bar in Cardiff, the day Wales played New Zealand. I think we got beaten 45-10 or something horrific.
