Shine

Shine

Oh let your little light shine,
let your little light shine,
shine on Wall Street and Vegas.
Place your bets.
Shine on the fishermen
with nothing in their nets;
shine on rising oceans
and evaporating seas;
shine on the Frankenstein technologies;
shine on science
with its tunnel vision;
shine on fertile farmland
buried under subdivisions.

Let your little light shine,
let your little light shine;
shine on the dazzling darkness
that restores us in deep sleep;
shine on whatever we throw away
and what we keep.

Shine on Reverand Pearson
who threw away
the vain old God,
kept Dickens and Rembrandt and Beethoven,
and fresh-plowed sod;
shine on the good earth, good air, good water
and a safe place
for kids to play;
shine on bombs exploding
half a mile away.

Let your little light shine;
shine on world-wide traffic jams,
honking day and night;
shine on another asshole
passing on the right!
Shine on the red-light runners
busy talking on their cell phones;
shine on the Catholic Church
and the prisons that it owns;
shine on all the churchs;
they all love less and less;
shine on a hopeful girl
in a dreamy dress.

Let your little light shine;
shine on good humor;
shine on good will;
shine on lousy leadership
licensed to kill;
shine on dying soldiers
in patriotic pain;
shine on mass destruction
in some God's name;
shine on the pioneers,
those seekers of mental health,
craving simplicity,
they traveled around
past themselves...
May all their little lights shine!

Joni Mitchell 2007