The song of the South Coast

Sometimes in sleep 
we can fly

And as I prepare to fly
for the final time

let my fly 
above my beloved Southland
and remember
everything that I love

I remember the scorn in her voice
when she told me there were more beautiful 
counties than Hampshire
but of course there aren't

North Hampshire with it's vast fields and dark woods
and the South with the grass and marsh and creeks

I fly above the the scar in the chalk
where the motorway cuts the down
and I recall the scars that cut through my heart
from Winchester my home

If I forget you O Winchester...
eternally my home
forget how like a child learns to love it's mother
I learned to love my first home

The river races deep and swift 
from the mills down to the meadows
and the Cathedral bells cry out in protest
to a church that has lost her God

In this cold dark night
we were out singing carols by lamplight
in the quiet villages 
among the fields and barns of my homeland

The lost towns of the north
Andover and Basingstoke
Ice skating days, days on the concrete
banjos and song, part of my story

these fields and gardens that I tended
in the golden north
give way to the shadows of the forest
and the city of my childhood

The great docks of Southampton
bring those memories of escape
childhood on the streets
and my brother, so close, so long ago

We climbed on the anchor and the bargate slope
we watched the ships 
and then here I am alone
broken but sustained by this forever bond
with this city I loved from so young

there is the southern line, the centre of my heart
from Bournemouth to Brighton it marks my home
with the track that cut through my heart from childhood
and remained my compass home forever

See the masts at Bursledon
crying in the wind
they sing the song of the southern land
echoed by the tracks

the great hills rise in memory
of a childhood on the shore
and your ghost is there where you used to run
and will run forevermore

Still up the line the trains run
the trains have changed 
but the names of the stations 
the lullaby of my childhood, remain the same

Old Winchester hill and the downs to Brighton
Scarred with shame and injustice remain
and the sea washes at Selsey and Hove
and the graves of my fellow travellers sleep

The meon valley full of mist
in the early morning
the great 272 and the rolling downs
the dark of the trees as their crowns

and so my wings are tired, 
and everything I love is here

I return to what I have held dearest
the last human love I felt
I return to you and the memories
of the corner

I remember those nights
under the stars, 
joyful, content, trusting, loving, loved
sleeping like a child in her mother's arms

I remember the hope that you gave me,
and how at last I could believe
then the shadows gathered over the great hill
and in the storm you were swept away

and so the storm broke
as I told you it would
and I made my way here, sorrowing, broken,
to the Great Ship Bay

waiting in the shadow of the Great Hills,  for the end
and waiting to return 
to my Southern line
and Sanctuary's shore, where my soul will rest,
the candle burning low

as I sing the song of the Southern land
and the solent
the only love I know
and  wait, to fly, my last great journey home

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xPuFcoHjPw