Davison's Doodle

Songwriters: David Gilmour / Roger WatersWish You Were Here (Live, Delicate Sound Of Thunder) lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Universal Music Publishing Group, Songtrust Ave, BMG Rights Management, Concord Music Publishing LLC

Ash Wednesday Lyrics

Ashes and diamonds
Foe and Friend
We were all equal in the end(1)

All kinds of Christians will hear words similar to those above with the more orthodox tone, “you are dust and to dust you shall return” or something similar. Smudge marks of a cross on foreheads or hands identify those among us convinced, convicted, or clinging to the old, old story unsure what it does to us, or for us, anymore. But, we want to belong. We want to believe. Jesus. Jesus, what’s it all about?

I’ve been smudged with ashes. I’ve smudged the old and the young alike. The world is full of mortality reminders. Coronavirus, the newest one. In a Nation consumed by “identity politics” we Christians play our part, particularly today. Of late many siblings in faith have embraced transactional relationships because the covenantal ones of old don’t seem to be working anymore or meeting needs. As if the Golden Rule or Greatest Commandment, like the hymn, “In The Very Room”(2) is spaciously specific theology. You don’t have to be cynical to observe that spaciously specific economics, ethnicity, gender, and religion are the norm now. Maybe the Rolling Stones are right. “You can’t always get what you want. But, if you try sometimes well you might just find, you’ll get what you need.”(3)

In the spring of my senior year of high school, Pink Floyd released “The Final Cut” (1983). I was already a fan, but this album captured the history classes and social studies of junior high and high school. It captured the stories I had heard from relatives, and the general fear of the late decades of the Cold War as people were just going about their lives. It challenged the Christianity that had been passed on to me. The album’s final song, “Two Suns in the Sunset,” is a daily ash reminder seared into my memory that makes ordinary time, everyday, a journey through lent. Shall we overcome?

In my rear view mirror
The sun is going down
Sinking behind bridges in the road
I think of all the good things
That we have left undone
And I suffer premonitions
Confirm suspicions
Of the holocaust to come

The rusty wire that holds the cork
that keeps the anger in
Gives way and suddenly
It’s day again
The sun is in the east
even though the day is done
Two suns in the sunset
Could be the human race is run

Like the moment when the brakes lock
And you slide towards the big truck
(Oh no!)
You stretch the frozen moments with your fear
And you’ll never hear their voices
(Daddy, Daddy!)
And you’ll never see their faces
You have no recourse to the law anymore

And as the windshield melts and my tears evaporate
Leaving only charcoal to defend
Finally I understand the feelings of the few
Ashes and diamonds
Foe and friend
We were all equal in the end.

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Notes
1. Pink Floyd, “The Final Cut”. Harvest Columbia, 1983.
2. Ron and Carol Harris, “In This Very Room”. Ron Harris Music, 1979.
3. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, “Let It Bleed”. Decca Records (UK), 1968.