Awake!

As a further exploration of my personality and philosophy through music, and that of Cat Stevens to boot, I share with you one of my favorite songs of all time. It's not one of his big hits, it just speaks to my soul:

They brang us up with horns and holly wooden songs
Dead snakes and poisoned wisdoms between our teeth
The evil that's been done still is carrying on
And on this night there'll be no peace

The old leaders' bones still beat on our homes
They built our life before us, we had no choice
The evil that's been done still is carrying on
And when they're gone we'll be the voice

Blue bird on the rock, slow wind blowing soft
Across the bare face of the sleeping lake
"Rise up and be free," voice whispered to me
And in this way you will awake

Go climb up on the hill, stand perfectly still
And silently soak up the day
Don't rush and don't you roam, don't feel so alone
And in this way you will awake
And in this way you will awake and this way you will awake

Pick up the pieces you see before you
Don't let your weaknesses destroy you
You know wherever you go the world will follow
So let your reasons be true to you

Stay close to your friends up until the end
And when they know that you feel the same way
Rise up and be free and die happily
And in this way you will awake
And in this way you will awake and this way you will awake
Awake c'mon, c'mon and awake

100 I Dream, Cat Stevens, from the Album Foreigner (1973).

About the same time I was reading The Gulag Archipelago and becoming a fan of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. The Cat Stevens song connects to a favorite quote from Solzhenitsyn:

"Blow the dust off the clock. Your watches are behind the times. Throw open the heavy curtains which are so dear to you -- you do not even suspect that the day has already dawned outside."

Which linked me to this, from Lehi's counsel to his sons in the Book of Mormon:

"O that ye would awake: awake from a deep sleep, yea, even from the sleep of hell, and shake off the awful chains by which ye are bound, which are the chains which bind the children of men, that they are carried away captive down to the eternal gulf of misery and woe."

2 Nephi 1:13.

I got the idea I needed to wake up. I've been trying to stay alert ever since.