From the recording Give To The Chase (live)
I wrote Give To The Chase when I was mothering my four young children and living in an off-the-grid yurt on a rainforest mountaintop in SE Queensland, Australia. This is when I recorded fully alone at home for the first time, which resulted in not only Give To The Chase, but my album Stories From The Red Tent, which is a concept album where a group of women hang out telling stories and creating connection amongst each other.
Here I personify Mother Earth, moving between singing as her and singing as myself. It’s a story of generations living within her environment and trying to save her, all’s the while being a member of human race, and only the fittest/strongest/smartest winning the race of survival.
On tour as my one woman band I perform Give To The Chase with just percussion and vocal, resulting in a shamanic song ringing in this plea to save mother earth that we are all a part of, to heal her and live in harmony with all of nature.
Lyrics
I hear you call my love and it hurts me to know you will fall on your journey of life
And I can’t always pick up the pieces of a broken toy or a broken dream
So I will try to teach you resilience, I will try to teach you hope
With patience, fortitude, perseverance, faith
You will plunge into life and enjoy her flight
So run my little one, run for your life,
Fly the currents, preserve mother earth,
Duck, dive, swoop, survive
Give to the chase, give to the chase
You’re in the human race
I hear the earth, mother, she is crying in pain at the ruin of her forests and trees
And the air is so think she can’t breathe now, she is coughing dirt and her eyes stream red
So I will try to teach all the children to clean her wounds, balm her pain
Make rivers flow, clean the air, plant trees,
She will bloom to life, all enjoy her flight
So run my little one, run for your life,
Fly the currents, preserve mother earth,
Duck, dive, swoop, survive
Give to the chase, give to the chase
You’re in the human race
I hear your voice, Nana, you are smiling at the vision clear, this view so dear
to your heart, Nana, to our future, ‘cause it hurts to watch your young destroy
All this beauty that we inherited, bounty that was ours to share
But you know we must, you know we trust,
We can save the earth, we can save her life… save her life
So run my little one, run for your life,
Fly the colours, preserve mother earth,
Duck, dive, swoop, survive
Give to the chase, give to the chase, give to the chase
You’re in the human race