From the recording Family Portraits (Volume 3)
A nine minute long, seven part-mini opera on the theme of kids.
Through-composed song in seven parts, none repeating, like a classical rhapsody, on the theme of kids; having them (or not); raising them. The song attempts to represent the parental experience from a variety of angles, refelected in the diversity of the genres and speeds employed across the seven sections. Also, each lyric is intended as a mini-vignette, a tiny story, .
Lyrics
Just Kids
Anxiously waiting for a
Sign
Will it be red or blue line?
Fingers crossed?
Off
The bucket list
A
Tick against the box
A milestone
Reached
Watch the bump grow
Worried what the future holds
The best laid plans of mice-and-men
Lost to the mists of
Time’s not on our side
Watch the clock
Swim against the tide
All of your love and dreams
Invested
In a life that
Grows inside
All of your dreams and hopes
In one fell swoop
Gone up in smoke
Pregnant
Expectant
By choice
Or accident
Treasured
Uncertain
Unwanted
Womb-to-rent
Naturally delivered
By scissors
Aborted
Still born
Premature
Test tube grown
Into this world we’re thrown…
Oh my!
Oh my!
Oh my!
My beating heart
Bursts with love and pride
My swollen heart spills over with love
For this child
Baby girl – you are my world
Bless your every curl!
Baby boy – you are my joy
Bless your every toy!
Barren body
Question identity
What meaning is there
If not this?
Biology?
Nature!
The force that shapes us all
Nature!
Every boy and girl in the world!
Destination known
Writ in code
In the human genome
Nurture!
The force that shapes us all
Nurture!
Every girl and boy in the world!
Shaped by parents and environment
That’s all
Sensible eldest
Mother’s little helper
Typical example of an only child, so selfish
Spoiled like the youngest are
Abandoned, adopted, orphan
Whats-his-dumb-f***-face, with no name
Forgotten middle children
Little children
Little children
Just kids
Just kids
Mere babes-in-the-woods
Anaphylactic shock
Allergic to chicken pox
A toddler, too torpid even to scratch her spots
I hope to God
There is no worry in the world worse
Than love for sick child in hospital
Agnostics pray to uncertain Gods
To save those they love and cherish most
There are no words
For fearing the worst
I can’t bear it
Perish the thought
Pushy parents, full of it
Sally is a prodigy
Tommy here has special needs
They’re all so special
Can’t you see?
Really they’re just ordinary
Slightly dull, unremarkable
With modicum intelligence
But even so they’re lovable
Adorable, even…
Love them for who they are
Not
For what you want them to be
They’re kids
Kids are just…kids
Kids are just…kids
Kids are just…kids