Song for Saigon…in words
As a few people have asked me to share the lyrics to ‘Song for Saigon‘ I thought it would be cool to share them with the world, so here they are.
Listen to and download ‘Song for Saigon’ on CD Baby,
Song for Saigon
Saigon growing up my window
She’s creeping right under my pillow
With warm lights and motorbikes and sleepless nights and I know,
It’s go with the flow
In this place which goes by many names,
Both different yet somehow the ‘same, same.’
There’s smiling and trying and guessing
..Means ‘no’ when you’re ‘yes-ing’…
Where the city sleeps whatever ways
A nap can be taken most times of day
A floor here, a desk, but by far the best is stretched
the length of a moped.
Stop, watch the ride
of the people who live, the people who give their
calm, moving tide
of peaceful exist; it’s hard to resist this life.
Hard to resist this life.
Language can defeat me
With much local hilarity
Em tên là Claire
một hai ba yo!
hẹn gặp lại
Rất vui được gặp em
Drumming dreaming anti-rhythm
The unrelenting sound of construction
Blends into calls of street food stalls and busy malls
Then hush; the heat of the day
There’s a beauty in her coloured hems
Old houses standing tall and thin since then
When bicycles and cyclos ruled before
The sound of an engine…
Such a happy, truthful open place
With an honest and an easy grace
The busy waves of peoples days and humid haze
Keeps on
While I’m just observing.
Saigon lives near, chaotic yet placid here
Rising high, her focus on present times.
It’s hard to resist this life.
Claire Cameron Copyright 2013.
