Laura by Stephen Paley
Here’s a piece in London’s Guardian in which a reader recommends ten great songs about nature–including Laura’s “Mother’s Spiritual.
Rob Fitzpatrick writes:
Laura Nyro sees nature as the ultimate mother, a giver, provider, a force above the squabbles of religion or commerce …
The album Mother’s Spiritual is, of course, Laura’s ultimate ecofeminist statement. I mean, who else was writing songs about trees in the early 1980s? (Who’s writing songs about trees now, for that matter?). But do y’all think that the song “Mother’s Spiritual” was about Mother Nature herself?? Here are the lyrics if you don’t know or remember them:
On a street corner where the kids boogie all night
or where the winds sing and the stars shine like
holiday lights, come a band of angels, salvation
in their might and as for peace on earth…
Feel this love, my brothers and sisters, feel the
season turn, she is the mother of time. Wonders
that take you, rivers that give, that’s where
mother’s spiritual lives
Talk of a ruby, love, lover’s share. Find your
love, lose your love here and there. So you go
home, do your own thing, the ocean sings to me
that love is always alive and part of thee.
Feel this love, my brothers and sisters, feel the
season turn, she is the mother of time. Light and
darkness come to her kiss cause that’s where
mother’s spiritual lives.
Come to the lights my sisters and take what you
need. Doesn’t matter, my brothers, your Sunday
creed cause each one’s a lover to this winter
night star, a pilgrim, a pioneer, that’s who you
are.
Feel this love, my brothers and sisters, feel the
season turn, she is the mother of time. It’s not
war, it’s life she gives and that’s where mother’s
spiritual lives.
Soul Picnic 