there is something so perfect about joanna doing her first performance in years & debuting new music so soon after the spring equinox: a symbol of new growth and fresh beginnings, and the beginning of the astrological year, for many, the true start of the new year. like maybe i’m delulu but i don’t think it’s a coincidence. either way it’s beautiful to me. i’m so excited for what’s to come in this new era!!!!
Joanna Newsom over Time. The ever present joy, love and endlessness!
Dublin, Ireland, March, 2016
Los Angeles, USA, March, 2023
she is sunshine personified !!!
Bombs Are Whistling
by Joanna Newsom
I face it with my flayed skull in the glacial morning wind
It burns like salt,
it’s not your fault
that I ain’t got no skin.
I ran into the dawn
until my voice was gone.
I call,
‘I love you through it all.’
They said I couldn’t hold you
when I tried to take your hand.
Alarm bells rang;
the nurse was saying things I can’t understand.
Too warm, too warm.
I drew my arm away against the glass.
‘Is he okay?‘
my flayed skull asked.
I prayed the fear would pass.
They say you need me here
more than I need that.
But I need it.
My eyes scan every place,
and I stand guard all night
in vigil, in warning and in waste.
Unheeded.
Wild,
too cold and blue.
But look at those curls.
How do you do?
Though I cannot imagine,
recall it or conceive.
I’m not going far away,
I know what I believe.
I know, I know, I know
because they tell me that it’s true
the spell will break me and wake me anew.
So I sit and rock and drop through space
and kiss your face and sing.
The smoke is thick,
my skin is sick,
the bombs are whistling.
The death, the doom,
the leaden, looming dread is always near.
But I love you,
and you are here.
I feared that it had won.
I feared that you would never find me,
my darling son.
But you found me.
And though it took awhile,
now I look and find your blinding starlight smile
surrounds me.
We bleed through,
clear and true.
Here with you now.
I wish that I could show you
what I know about this pain.
I’ll tell ya now, I don’t know how,
but I’ll be back again.
For bowing in the scouring wind that lays low everything.
‘I love you,‘
my flayed skull sings.
Just thinking about Joanna Newsom performing new material for the first time in 8 years and just immediately putting the entire music industry in a chokehold, with her magnificence.
To quote her husband:
"...she’s brilliant in a way that I feel like almost no one else is; it’s such a specific kept space that only she occupies"
And now she's back to reclaim it and we are all so blessed 💕




























