Sudbury · Track 6 · middle
Great Meadows' Breath
A song celebrating Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, a vital conservation area within Sudbury, and its role as a sanctuary for diverse native plant communities.
Lyrics
[Intro] Great Meadows… I am here to listen. To feel your slow breath on the water. [Verse 1] They say you are a refuge, a line drawn on a map. A gift of the Sudbury, a gift of the Concord. But you were always here. A wide, green lung breathing with the flood. A floodplain memory, holding the spring melt in your cupped hands. You remember the weight of the winter ice. The press of it, the slow release. You remember the old names whispered by the river reeds. [Chorus] You are the long exhale of the land. The quiet beat in the heart of the wetlands. You hold the cardinal flower's scarlet flare, the seed's old promise buried there. This is the breath before the word. The sanctuary, seen and heard in the call of a bird. [Verse 2] I walk the dike road, a guest in your house. I see the blue flag iris, a purple fire in the green. I see the buttonbush, a constellation for the bees. This is the table you set. The swamp milkweed for the monarch's child. The arrowhead leaf, sharp and clean, rising from the silt. Each root a story, each blossom a vow you have kept since the last glacier pulled back its cold, white sheet. [Chorus] You are the long exhale of the land. The quiet beat in the heart of the wetlands. You hold the cardinal flower's scarlet flare, the seed's old promise buried there. This is the breath before the word. The sanctuary, seen and heard in the call of a bird. [Bridge] The sound of Route 117 is a distant shore. A world away from this slow, vital core. They drew a line to save you, a promise made in 1944. A promise to the mud and the cattail spore. A promise to let you be what you have always been. A place for life to land, and begin again. [Outro] Great Meadows… Your breath is in the heron's patient stance. In the silent ripple of the water's dance. I am listening. I am listening.