Chinmaya’s songs to nature and life’s mysteries, composed and sung 1996-2023
1 CHARLIE GIRL
Composed Pune 1989. Several versions recorded in the ’90s. Finally sung it myself in 2023
This evening makes me think
About the times when I was young with Charlie girl
Hadn’t a care in the world
We were too young
Hadn’t a care in the world
We were too young to know
Some magic in the air tonight
Makes me think of twilights long ago
We never knew that it would pass
We didn’t know
We never knew that it would pass
We didn’t know nothing last
And as I linger here recalling
Charlie’s laughter, darkness falling
Hadn’t a care in the world
We didn’t know
Hadn’t a care in the world
We were too young to know
And as the last of daylight fades and dies
The evening star reflects in Charlie’s eyes
I started learning there
I learned to know
I started learning there
We are alone, Charlie girl
We are alone
Even while we share
2 NOW SUMMERS HERE AGAIN
Composed Amsterdam 1996, recorded in Hamburg 1996 and Pune 2000
The morning sun is bright against my window
Dozing here I watch the day begin
I won’t hardly need no clothes between the sunlight and my skin
Now summer’s here again
It’s like an unplanned party all that laughter in the street
Even strangers smile like friends
And the children’s apple cheeks look good enough to eat
Now summer’s here again
Had enough of wind and rain
Had my fill of cold and pain
Goodbye to stress and strain
Summer’s here again
That cherry tree is daring me to climb up really high
Every year we play the same old game
She keeps her nicest fruit way up near the sky
Now summer’s here again
Through the wood I hear the river calling me to come
Kick off my things and jump right in
This year if someone’s willing I’d like to live a dream
Make love beside a stream
Afternoon I’ll throw my head down deep in meadowgrass
Breathe in the smell of new-mown hay
Today I’ll follow my nose just wherever it wants to go
Now summer’s here again
Evening time we’ll get together round an open fire
And sing our songs beneath the stars
Flute, guitar, a violin and my old tambourine
Now summer’s here again
3 ALL IS WORSHIP (Inspired by Rumi)
Recorded in 1999 in Pune and dedicated to Naveena
All that there is, is worship
To touch your mouth
To climb in the peach trees branches
Swaying as the storm strikes lightening
On the mountains of the south
To lie with you
To weep alone
While the huntress moon moves on
Past Mars and Venus
And seizes the heart for her own
——-
All that there is, is worship
To lie with you
While the sun dusts us with colours in it’s rising
Rising new
To rest in sweet surrender on the sand
Leaving my unprotected heart
Beating, held in your hand
——–
There are so many ways
To kneel and kiss the ground
——-
All that there is, is worship
To lie with you
To lie alone
Remembering the bitter winter hunger
While we feast on the summer fruit
All is worship now
All worship
Only more deeply now it’s known
4 NY TAK FOR ALLE
My loose translation of a song by Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson (1860’s)
Recorded in Maui 1997
Now thanks for all we shared when young
And field and forest held our games
I thought our playing would go on
Until the time our hair grew grey
I thought our playing would go on
Beneath the shining leaves of birch
From where our summerhouse high on the hill
Down to the red painted village church
Since then I’ve waited time on time
Up there where deer and eagles play
But shadows passed over darkening hills
And you – you didn’t find the way
Nu takk for alt, ifra vi var sma
Og spelte sammen i skog og lade
Ik tenkte spelen den skulde ga
Opp I de granende dage
5 THIS MOMENT
From the poem by Kathleen Raine. Recorded in New Zealand 2019
Never, never again this moment, never
These slow ripples across smooth water,
Never again these clouds white and grey
In sky sharp crystalline blue as the tern’s cry
Still in light air salt from the ocean
Sweet from flowers.
The sun that rises upon one earth
Sets on another, swiftly the flowers
Are waxing and waning, the tall yellow iris
Unfold its corolla as primroses wither,
Scrolls of fern unroll and midges
Dance for an hour in the evening air,
The brown moth from its pupa emerge
And the lark’s bones fall apart in the grass.
6 EASY’S RIGHT
Composed in a Munich garden 1996, recorded in Hamburg and my vocals and keys Pune 2000
Sitting out in my garden, I watch a bird
Does it worry about tomorrow?
That’d be absurd!
In the spring does the grass decide
Whether or not to grow?
It just follows its own nature
The way its nature goes
Religion’s confusing you with darkness and light
Whichever you choose won’t be easy
And easy’s right
Imagine the moon complaining that the sunlight isn’t fair
Or trees embarrassed, when autumn strips them bare
Is a weed ashamed to be seen
Growing next to a rose?
It just follows its own nature
The way its nature goes
Without the torture of comparison
Life is such a delight
When you know that the right way is easy
And easy’s right
You run and run, but inside you can’t rest
Your search for security just leads you to stress
Drop the mind, it’s the heart that knows best!
It’s the heart that knows best, easy’s right
Is a cat by the fire concerned
With failure or success?
No opinions bother her
She simply takes her rest
Does the snow when the winter comes
Plan which way to fall?
It just follows its own nature
No room for doubt at all
Ambition is killing you, as you compete for the heights
You forgot that the right way is easy
And easy’s right
Why worry when life’s so clear
What the moralists write?
The right way to be is easy
And easy’s right
7 MUSIC FOR PEOPLE LIKE YOU AND I
Based on a riff by Makassey Orchestra. Recorded with Koyal UK 2022
Listen to the cries of the creatures in the forest
Listen to the song of the birds in the sky
Listen to the footsteps of the people walking through the land
People like you and I
Listen to the children as they raise their eyes skyward
Listen to those getting ready to die
Listen to the givers, the healers and the dreamers
People like you and I
And what doesn’t kill us will make us stronger
What isn’t true we need to call a lie
I listen to the whispers that ripple from the heartbeats
Of people like you and I.
The sun that rose from the sea this morning
Will never return, for the broadcast light
That brightens the leaves and glances on water
Will travel tonight on its long journey
Out of the universe,
Never this sun, this world, and never again this watcher.
