Shakesides Dream

One of my favourite local walks goes along the shore past an old boarded up house.The place looks out on a salmon stream and salt marshes teaming with birds.
Being a newcomer to the area it took me a while to find out that the house is under a demolition order. Built by Hamilton Mack Laing, a well known artist, ornithologist and writer, who donated the house and considerable funds to our town in order to create a natural history museum, a succession of local governments reneged on the agreement and things are not looking good.
I`ll send this song to the folks trying to save the house.

Style is _STOMPIN.STY (Stompin' Train Indie Folk)

RealTracks in style: ~~2478:Bass, Acoustic, Held Ev 110
RealTracks in style: 1295:Banjo, Rhythm, ModernCountrySync Ev16 100
RealTracks in style: ~598:Guitar, Acoustic, Strumming Bluegrass Doc Ev 100
RealTracks in style: ~~618:Fiddle, Background Allis Ev 120
Loop in Song: House-Techno-Trance\House - crunchy_120_b drums ev16.wav

Shakesides Dream

this old house is a story
a good man`s life in 3D
60 years of gales and gardens
owl-eyed windows have seen
when the floorboards start creaking
his rocking chair will tell the tale
of birds and work and wonder
at the end of Mack Laing`s trail

he rode across the prairie
on his infernal machine
set his ready-cut kit house
where salt grass meets the sea
six weeks to split the shakes every nail
hammered by the same hand
drew the falcon and the robin
wrote the soul of this land


don`t take Shakesides dream
don`t put its treasure
in a dumpster with the beams
let our children lean from the windows
watching salmon swim upstream
please don`t take Shakesides dream

can you hear the kids come laughing
through the woods down the creek
asking whats inside the old house
still has so much to teach
how to be good for something
a trust is not for sale
and the birds the work the wonder
at the end of Mack Laing`s trail

don`t take Shakesides dream
don`t put its treasure
in a dumpster with the beams
let our children lean from the windows
watching salmon swim upstream
please don`t take Shakesides dream

© Robert Cordrey Sept.2017