Kristin Lems: Song Lyrics, samples

HONORABLE MENTION AWARD 2011 GREAT LAKES SONGWRITING CONTEST!!  Randy Newman also wrote a song about this catastropic 1970 event.  I sang this for Captain Jacques Cousteau, with Tim Vear, and it was a high point of my performing life.  Luckily, caring people did "stay by it" and the Cuyahoga has now been brought back.  Every river needs such protection from its human stewards.

*HONORABLE MENTION AWARD* Great Lakes Songwriting Contest 2011!!    1. I've lived upon this river shore since I was very small/ I've watched the seasons turning and I've seen the trees grow tall/I've seen the factories coming to clutter on the shore/ They dump their waste into our lake, and every day there's more/ CHORUS:  Oh lovely waters that have carried my canoe/ Cuyahoga River, what have they done to you?/ 2. Once we would go fishing in rowboats every dawn/ Now all we see is tanker ships, and all the fish are gone/ We could see trout swimming full twenty feet below/ But now the water's turned to ink, no matter where we row/ 3.  Our river it was clean and clear, we'd swim there every day/ Now it's far too dangerous, a fence keeps us away/ The sun upon the water shone sparkling and royal/ But now we see a rainbow from reflections in the oil/ 4. Late last Friday I drove home, smelled fire in the air/ Couldn't tell the origin, the smoke was everywhere/ A sheet of flame rose through the clouds, it cut them like a knife/ I saw the river up in flame and giving up its life/ 5. Now the ashes settle on a charred and cindered lake/Staying by this shoreline is a terrible mistake/ But the Cuyahoga's seen me grow, and now I've seen it die/ Figure I'll stay by it, though I cannot tell you why