lost

I don't know why I want to include this, except that I can't get it out of my head. When I first heard it, I could only weep for my daughter Emma. I wondered if perhaps the artist (Emmylou Harris) had herself lost a baby. the more I listen to it, the more I wonder if it is a different kind of lost. a Tieran kind of lost. either way, it is more than a song, it seems to me a prayer. And I pray it today for all the Emmas and Tieran's, some lost and found, and some still wandering. I pray for the mothers who lost and the mothers who are chasing, or waiting, or weeping. God bless people who can write lyrics like this, they are sometimes my only window to sanity. It brings me sanity today because I know the Shepherd will do the job that earthly parents cannot always muster.

MY BABY NEEDS A SHEPHERD, by Emmylou Harris, album Red Dirt Girl

My baby needs a shepherd, She's lost out on the hill
Too late I tried to call her when the night was cold and still
And I tell myself I'll find her but I know I never will
My baby needs a shepherd, she's lost out on the hill

My baby needs an angel, She never learned to fly
She'll not reach sanctuary just by looking to the sky
I guess I could have carried her But I didn't even try
My baby needs an angel She never learned to fly

Oh I ran so far through a broken land
I was following that drummer Beating in a different band
And somewhere on the highway I let go of her hand
Now she´s gone forever Like her footprints in the sand

Toora loora, loora lo
First the seed and then the rose
Toora loora, loora li My kingdom for a lullaby

My baby needs a pilot She has no magic wand
To help her part the troubled waters of the Rubicon
But in my soul I know she'll have to go this one alone
After all that is the only way she's ever known

But there is no lamp in all this dark
That could chase away her shadow From the corners of my heart
I pray she'll ride a dolphin But she's swimming with the shark
Out where none can save her not even Noah and his ark

Toora loora, loora lo To the cradle comes the crow
Toora loora, loora li My kingdom for a lullaby

My baby needs a mother To love her till the end
Up every rugged mountain And down every road that bends
Sometimes I hear her cryin' But I guess it´s just the wind
My baby needs a mother To love her till the end