Ravelsway
The cover art above is one of the sketches drawn for the album cover as I was experimenting with my new Wacom tablet in Affinity Photo (including a dry brush pen and splatter pens, plus various distortion and noise filters), namely a representation of a rainbow of light swaying and swirling and raveling into threads and pieces… a liminal lemniscate.
The inspiration for this song emerged in a way that is new for me. I was considering all of the songs that I wanted to include on the upcoming album, and the notion of motion floated to the top since that is a prominent influence on these works… specifically a sort of (sometimes waltzy) swaying that ravels into sleep and dreams (with a tip of the hat to Maurice Ravel as well). It’s kinda like a kid oscillating into sleep in a high-chair at mealtime (or me trying to listen to lectures). I decided that since I was identifying a unifying theme across a set of songs, then I wanted a title track that would embody that album concept, hence Ravelsway.
In approaching those unifying lyrics, I originally thought that I might capture some of the peaceful, beautiful ymages around here, so I wandered into my yard where I soon saw a bigtooth aspen expressing thousands of instances of the ASL sign for “applause,” and that became the origin of the line, “silver-whist applause of aspen shimmer-leaves,” where “whist” (meaning something like an attentive stillness) is still familiar in contemporary English in that it gave rise to “wistful” (and people still play the card game).
That line suggested that I might describe other moving entities in my environment by appealing to relative iconicity, such as the that floats from rocks and other anchor points in creeks and so on, by using collections of phonesthemes (which is not a new idea, of course… I reinvent lots of stuff). So I made lists of the words found in the liquid/nasal/approximant phonestheme families (e.g., fl-, hw-, sl-, and similar) because I was tired of having to engineer pops and clicks out of the vocals of songs that had close mic work, and I knew that this was going to be one of those. But of course focusing on that vocab only helped just so much.
Once I started playing with the words and sounds (and it really was playtime for me), that additional purpose of trying to get all poetic about nature and whatnot started to overburden this fun little song, so I decided to leave that material to appear in some other work (other than the aspen bit, of course).
There is a whole lot going on in the lyrical patterns here, and nurturing all of those different bits of consistency required some appeal not only to some older vocabulary items but some lighthearted nonsense as well… which I treasure. And yes, “gallows” would have fit the pattern in the fifth verse more closely, but I was also making decisions to avoid words whose meanings did not blend with the pleasant theme; besides, Jell-O® does glisten and move and all of that. (That is one reason that I did not include the sn- family in the song.) There is a Shakespeare ping in the ‘raveled sleeve’ lyric, and a professional legitimization of the sublime Calvin and Hobbes “galosh” coinage.
I made an appeal to instruments that have fluid, gliding (glissando-friendly) sounds, such as: cristal baschet, theremin, glass harmonica, Array mbira and Sansula, cello drones, vibraphone, and pedal steel guitar (without going “Hawaiian”)… although there is also some string plucking for an engaging punctuation. The whistling (which seemed needed given the /hw-/ verse) blends into other instruments, such that it starts out sounding more person-made and ends up more clearly instrument-made.
I might have something more (or different) to say later, but this is plenty for now.
[2026-05]
Lyrics
What a sleepy little song...
hushing drowse of breeze and fluffy sheep
silver-whist applause of aspen shimmer-leaves
raveled dreamer-sleeves of phonesthemes
to limber-loll our lulling byes to sleep
Ravelsway
ravelsway
ravelsway
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
First your body slips into the sway...
swell swing swoop,
swirl swish sweet swoon
swivel sweepy-swarms of swallows
swirl-a-jig
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
Next your breathing whirls into the way...
whelm wing whoop,
whirl whisk wheat whoosh
whisper weepy-whims of willows
whirligig
whittle, whicker, an' whence
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
Then your music fades into the fly...
float fling floop,
furl flip fleet flush
flutter flowy-farms of phellows
furl-a-wing
flitter, flicker, an' flounce
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
Feel your selfness into the slide...
slope sling sloop,
slur slip sleek slosh
slumber sleepy-slows of shallows
slither, slicker, an' silence
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
Drops of dreams drip into the glide...
glow glimpse gloop,
girl glint gleam g'losh
glimmer glossy-glows of jellos
glisten-ring
glitter, , an' glance
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
Now only hum a random meander inside...
mermaid Ming moon,
marl mint meet
murmur mellow-moss of mallows
mutter, mucker, an' manse
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
What a sleepy little song...
hushing drowse of breeze and fluffy sheep
silver-whist applause of aspen shimmer-leaves
raveled dreamer-sleeves of phonesthemes
to limber-loll our lulling byes to sleep
Ravelsway
ravelsway
ravelsway
We yawn,
an' yawn,
an' yawn.
listen
listless
linger
languor
lullaby
bye… bye
(bye)
This would be a great name for a wizard.
I turned “swain” into a denominal verb representing a type of romantic persuasion. This is one of the many ways in which my PhD pays for itself.
Associated with a Yiddish term meaning” happiness” and “luck.”
Ya know, like when you squish a dog’s muzzle or something, like a variation on smoosh… a shayna punim kinda thing.