Key: G major•
Verse 1
March 1972, leaving
San
Francisco, flying over the
Pacific to
Hawaii and thence to the island of
Fiji.
Songs written on that trip,
the first for slack key guitar to the tune of
Sweet
Leilani
after visiting the
Bishop
Museum in
Honolulu.
Sweet
F
G
O 'ahu, got petroleum, superhighways,
D
G
Bb
F#
G
glass hotels, old
B
C
G
Hawai 'is buried under
D
G
steamboat mu seums, sugar hills,
B
C
G
bishop estates, leases, homesites, to the
G
F#
G
C
B
C
An d the military highways
G
D
G
closed off to the ocean over
Koli
Koli.
Sweet
C
G
O 'ahu, got petroleum,
D
G
F#
superhighways, glass hotels.
Old
G
B
G
Hawaii's buried under steamboat museums,
D
F#
G
B
C
G
sugar hills, bishop estates, leases, homesites
To the
D
G
F#
Kaiser in the stream
G
B
C
G
And the military highways closed off
D
G
To the ocean over
Koli
Koli
Sweet
C
B
G
O 'ahu, got petroleum,
D
G
superhighways, glass ho tels.
F#
Old
B
C
G
Hawaii's buried under
Steamboat
D
F#
Museum's sugar hills
Bishop
B
C
G
Es tates leases home sites to the
G
F#
B
G
C
And the military highways
Coley,
Coley.
Ciritoka
Beach
Croon, quatrains, mirror image, two poems,
four quatrains each, written sitting
on the beach, no particular music in mind,
C
G
C
B
I closed my eyes on
G
C
G
F#
Fiji sands and what did I think of next?
C
G
You, big -eared listener,
and the
Prajnaparamita texts,
Herman
G
C
G
Melville's rhyme on olden
Marquesa shore,
Jack
C
G
F
A light rose up my body and spine
C
G
as children ripples fell
Smiling head that consciousness
F#
B
G
reached all my teachers in hell
B
C
F
Oh music that washes from shore to shore
C
G
Oh rhythm turned centuries old
Sing through our mouths and
C
B
wake the great mind,
F
C
G
C
The bard's first chanting foretold.
I opened my eyes on
B
Ebm
F#
Australian children yelling at wavelets,
G
C
a rowboat in shade of the tree.
F
C
Peaceful chatter of baby waves, white caps distant reef roar,
B
G
F#
B
birds whistling through green palm arms, jeep tires speeding the shore.
that swims on the shallow tide
through which our war bombers ride
Thank you.
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TunerE A D G B E
ChordsG F D Bb F#...
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