Good Morning Josie

Words and Music: Pat Drummond.

For Carol and Josie Drummond, with love;

and for the wonderful staff of Blue Mountains Anzac Memorial Hospital, with gratitude.

Dateline : Katoomba 3/8/1994

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As I write these cover notes, the bustling preparations for a birthday gathering are drifting through the doors of my study. It is the second birthday of the little girl we almost lost. On August 3rd at 7.10 am after an exhausting labor, Carol gave birth to Josephine Eve Drummond. Some twenty-one years after our first child, Matthew, and thirteen years after Meghan, our 'last'; Josephine is as loved as she was unexpected and she has transformed our lives. Her name literally means 'She shall add / life"...and she'll have to; Carol and I will be sixty by the time she is eighteen. I came home from the labour ward exhausted, wrote this song and fell asleep. It is for all who have known the tempest of emotions that surround a difficult birth.

 

Good Morning Josie, I heard you cry last night.

I saw a storm of pain go raging through your mother's eyes.

Somewhere just beyond the breakers I could hear the stormbirds cry.

Good Morning Josie, it's been a rugged night.

 

Good Morning Josie, I heard her cry last night.

There was no way I could help her as her boat was swept from sight.

I could hear you in the water just a heartbeat from the light.

Good Morning Josie, it's been a rugged night.

 

Her face was pale and tight.

My fists were knots of white.

The midwife's words were reassuring but her eyes were much too bright.

You were so far from me;

out there upon the sea;

and I could hear the sailors calling,"Will our baby be alright?"

 

Good Morning Josie, you gave us such a fright;

footsteps running in the corridor; faces masked in white.

Somewhere out beyond the storm clouds I could see the lightning strike.

Good Morning Josie, it's been a rugged night.

 

We have the land in sight,

I felt the tempest's might.

A little girl swam up above me; cherry red and waxy white.

One great wave so vast,

swept me off my feet at last.

I could hear the Captain calling,"Strap that sailor to the mast!"

 

Good Morning Josie. I know I look a wreck

but I was washed up in a storm last night and tossed about the deck.

Now your mother's here beside me and her smile is warm and bright.

The sweetest sound I ever heard;

a symphony within a word;

the sweetest sound of all;

I heard you call last night.

 

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