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Musica Millefolium

by Lightnin' Seed

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1.
Stone Root 03:18
I've been admiring you for some time always swayin' in the breeze as I'd walk by I thought you were nettles the first time I saw you but it turns out they call you “horse balm” who knows where these names come from like mine's Brenna but I always wanted it to be something else like francis or franky but thats what my family named me Back when I was a baby and you come from a family of mint deadnettle lemon balm skullcap catnip a far flung family well-fostered ya'll grow tall and prosper you got those sawtooth leaves that sit on a square stem growing opposite You stay east of the rockies most of the time just like the fireflies and the prickly ash and the sweet gum tree and catalpa and kentucky coffee and I'm just so hella west coast I never had a chance to get this close to you or the chiggers that hopped on me when I went out to pick your leaves cuz word is you got powers way beyond the beauty of your late summer flowers and the song you whispered in my ear for the groundhog the goose and the fox and the deer Stoneroot, stoneroot It's plants like you that help me give a hoot cuz it was all just green to me a mysterious sea of unknown leaves Stoneroot, stoneroot its plants like you that help me stay astute cuz it was all just green to me a mysterious sea of unknown leaves
2.
I can't always stick around in this sleepy one horse town Sometimes I gotta stick my thumbs out and go Out and go go go out and go go go Sometimes I gotta stick my thumbs out and go When I'm gone you can crash in my bed I just ask Keep my tincture good and shook up while I'm gone Keep my tincture good and shook up keep my tincture good and shook up Keep my tincture good and shook up while I'm gone You might call it Klamath weed and whack it underneath your trees Or watch it bloom on St. John's Day On his day day day on his day day day Yellow flowers on St. John's Day Oscar Wilde said Salome wanted his head Well I just want to pick at his warts At his warts warts warts at his warts warts warts I just picked some St. John's Wort She put his head on a platter but I don't see how that matters Cuz these little flowers keep my head on right Head on right right right head on right right right Hypericum you get that head just right Keep my tincture good and shook up lest that mold go and build up Like it's done everywhere else in my house In my house house house in my house house house Those little black spores are putting me out But when I come back home to you we can take a dropper or two And go out dancing all night long All night long long long all night long long long We'll go out dancing all night long Keep our booties good and shook up keep our booties good and shook up Keep our booties good and shook up all the time All the time time time all the time time time Keep our booties good and shook up all the time
3.
A carpet of flame on the forest floor the pines just watch with a calm gaze around here they get these kinds of storms the lightning comes without the rain but these trees are wise ones they got a plan for when the fire comes pitch flows to fill the holes when the flames get in past their thick skin but, 100 years, no fire comes to clear the way for saplings in full sun in the shade the spruce and fir come up and the old pines die of blister rust Baby bear, I swear, we used to eat like fucking kings the treasure troves of pine nuts we stole from the squirrels but we never felt like thieves baby bear I swear there used to be so many pines but in these pine ghost forests we gotta wonder how we're going to survive white bark pine bent down on the desert floor so stressed they can't even make cones are they bent down giving thanks to birds who brought their seeds out here to be sown? They know they would've had to crawl back one generation at a time but nutcrackers carries seeds and buried them in the burnt ground to hide they emerge the forgotten cache like eggs that hatched with no mama tree to live a life of prostrate thanks to forgetful mama birds who always leave Baby bird the word is please Stick around the rocky moountains need you when the fire finally burns them to their ground baby bird I know it's slim pickin' in the pines In the pines, in the pines, will there be pines If you fly out of rocky mountain high?
4.
Summertime 02:51
I go out to the woods when I'm looking for some wisdom I reset my head to the gentle chaos rhythm Of the snow melt moving cold and clear down the creek And I listen to the calls coming from the birds' beaks Everybody's chilling on an early summer day I get down on the ground and a toad jumps away Mosquitoes circle round like vultures where I sit And I really hope I don't get bitten by a tick A spider crawls up and I say "hi!"  I don't squash it with my foot I just let it pass by A bee buzzes up and stops on my knee I say "thanks for pollinating flowers and fruit trees You're doing something I could never do Cuz that pollen makes ah-ah-ah-ah-choooooo!"  I'm a little allergic but I like it outside I don't have a car but I still got a ride A little blue toughy mountain bike Handlebars are crooked but that's alright I don't care a bit, it's totally ok Cuz you know that I swing to the left anyway So I walk that trail and I deviate  And the path I take ain't exactly straight And I laugh and write and dance and sing And watch all the freaky people do their beautiful thing In the summertime I'm out of school but I still gotta learn Cuz I'm hot for knowledge like a mental sunburn  So I read in the heat with a book on my knees In the breeze by the flowers that some may call weeds Let me tell you how dandelions spread seeds They just shake them off and they go where they please And they fly wherever the wind's gonna blow And that's just like how ideas grow A seed gets planted in someone's mind And it germinates and it takes its time And a little bit of green pokes out Of the ground and it turns into a sprout That grows into a big idea That gives its seeds up to the air And it gets to flying and it gets around And it gets itself into new ground And if you give it some love and patience New ideas will bloom with crazy variations This is how creatures evolve  And this is how the world revolves  And if there's a problem then there's always a solution Cuz the only constant in the world is revolution So it you got some ideas that you wanna see grow Shake em off, let em go In the summertime.
5.
She thinks tanglin' my stalk Is funny They call her a weed but they sell her for money She'll wack you out if you eat her seeds She swears like a sailor when she's growin' her leaves But she's my viney, I'm her twiny, She's never gonna let me go Ain't pollinated since the moon passed Uranus I caught him once with his pistil in my stamens He gets fly with the birds and freaky with the bees Down and dirty with the horn worm sleaze But he's my trellis, I don't get jealous I'm never gonna let him go Folks they call her morning glory or hedge bindweed, I just call her horny She wraps herself around my cage Trumpet flowers right up in my face She takes a hoe'in and keeps on growin' She's never gonna let me go He just loves rubbin' off his oils pops one off he sprays ketchup on the soil He's pretty acidic but he gets things done turns carbon dioxide into oxygen His heirloom heiny is juicy and finey i'm never gonna let him go In spite of the drought, We'll end up bustin' some seeds out Against all odds, we're volunteerin' for sunshine Some critter found your round red fruits so tasty Dropped a log now there's a dicot pointing up to the sky
6.
With the sunrise came a storm. Clouds climbed in, made the moring dark. "We've been waiting," sing the leaves. "For you to get here from the sea, we're thirsty." Only half the rain that was due fell to us in July and June. But with the sunrise came the storm, clouds climbed in made the morning dark.
7.
Devil's Club 02:21
He calls me to the woods in the stormy weather He's got his own ways to make me remember Thorns in my skin and they're starting to fester That's how I know we're always gonna be together They call you bad cuz you're down in the dirt But I got a good trowel and I don't mind the work The devil's on my side leaning on a spiky cane I got ashes on my tongue I got fire in my brain I gotta fight with thorns for the branches that I love I wrestle fallen angels in the devil's club I got no illusions about the way that you been up in me Obsession lust and gluttony  Addicted to the company Honey it's the truth I got a sugar tooth And I wanna bite into The devil's kiss bitter on my lips And it's got me Tops me stops me from getting too sloppy Keep a loose grip on And good is good for nothing if there isn't something Just a little bad
8.
I wanted to wake you, It seemed you had a bad dream. What with the way you sweat and shook, what with how terrible you looked, and you were swollen at your seams. And I had just sewn you up, put you to bed and then I tucked you in. But we're just full of these tremors and quakes. It doesn't matter if we're asleep or awake. Like giving birth to something everyday that was just born to perish and decay. But do the dreams hide in thte folds? Where they're forgotten unless written down or told I wanted to know you but I wasn't even close. You see there's something there that's broke. A little flower that gets choked from sun and air by the weeds that grow easily, they just pop up you didn't even plant the seed. And here I tended and toiled like a fool. I thought to survive tht's what we had to do but now I know that you don;t have to work. you could always just settle for what's in the dirt. God I want to break through but i just keep hitting walls, the little bird hits glass and falls, and was she trying to fly to her reflection? And if it had been a real bird, I'm sure she would've know to swerve. She would've loved me for my nerve. i had a dream I was in the woods, shimmering snow and shimmering birds. Silver feathers glowing blue and green, and they were birds that I had Never Before Seen, I Had Never Before Seen.  
9.
To A Fish 02:15
Summertime and we gotta get out  Of the stuffy musty nasty house So we go down to the creek  Where little fish nibble at your feet And make you scream and make you holler Make you jump out of the water You dry off then you're hot again So you put your hair up and jump back in A wild run of salmon and bass And fried lake trout come swimming pass And pull you in the current quick And swim off smoother than an oil slick You grew a tail and shiny skin Scales and gills and Arturo fins And now you hang out with your fish friends And you're never gonna have to poop in a ditch again I seen leeches on beaches and private eyes Hair and Nair on American thighs I seen jumbo jets and little birds Dropping turds like two cent words I seen the good get better and the bad get worse I seen dragonflies mating on shepherd's purse I seen government spying through a satellite dish But I never seen a woman turn into a fish Summertime and I gotta get cool  And I got no AC and I got no pool So I go down where the water flows Something starts kissing on my toes It's the prettiest fish I ever seen With big brown eyes looking coy at me And before I can wonder who it is It's gone to do it's fishy biz
10.
You can feel the fire as devastating but then the forest is resilient and full of seeds. On the blackened river, rowing away, constantly fighting the anchor's weight and wanting so badly to stay. All around are the ruins of the green cathedral and the ghosts there they tell you that it is all healable, but you barely believe. So full of promise that you feel you might burst, roots so drunk with life but still dreaming with that thirst that first sent them to searching and reaching towards sustenance. Your ancestors burned down, you grow as an altar to them. All around there inside you are a green cathedral. The young shoots and the vines they show you that you are healable, But you barely believe

about

“The closer you look the more magical and magnificent and mysterious something is. It's our problem that we don't look close enough, not the problem of the universe, not the problem of science and chemistry that we don't look close enough.....but when we do look close enough and when we come to appreciate what the chemistry symbolizes, what in fact it is.....then we are always brought down into mystery.”

-Bill Mitchell, 1947-2007

Lightnin' Seed is Mark Gunnery and Brenna Sahatjian.

Lightnin' Seed would like to thank Merlin Pohl, Christopher Buckingham and Kendra Larson, Charlene Mowery-Pizzadili and Jimmy Combs, Joshum Hardy, Rebby, Adhamh Roland, Daniel Mathews, Harriet, all our patient Kickstarter contributors, Lilu, John Prine and Iris Dement, Digable Planets, Greg, Annie, Stefanie, Andrew, Ryan, Leah, Dendron, Riot Folk, Rebecca Snow, Larken Bunce, Sarah Van Hoy, Herukhuti Williams, and YOU!

Most of all the plants, “cuz you're doin' somethin I could never do.”

In memory of Marcella "Sali" Grace Eiler.

“Caught a light sneeze caught a light breeze caught a lightweight lightning seed.”

-Tori Amos

credits

released October 31, 2013

Brenna Sahatjian: Vocals, guitar, cello, keys
Mark Gunnery: Vocals, guitar, cigar case dulcimer, bass, drum machine

All songs written by Brenna Sahatjian and Mark Gunnery

Recorded by Brenna and Mark in Baltimore Summer 2010 and by Christopher Buckingham and Kendra Larson in Portland Winter 2011.

Mixed by Mark

Mastered by Andrew Eppig.

Cover art by Joshum Hardy

CD packaging design by Stefanie Mavronis

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Lightnin' Seed

Lightnin' Seed is Brenna Sahatjian and Mark Gunnery. They sing songs about herbs, storms, and natural phenomena. They are both members of the Riot Folk Collective and are DIY herbalists, artists, and writers.

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