Therefore, she hummed the provincial lullaby she had learned from the officers’ children in the English Quarter of Jerusalem, and watched in fascination while the savage radical’s eyes misted over with tears. For an instant, the prison bars melted away, and she felt God’s presence—for the first time since their imprisonment. She was not a captive, and this man was not her captor. Indeed, they were both merely God’s children.
A successful song comes to sing itself inside the listener. It is cellular and seismic, a wave coalescing in the mind and in the flesh. There is a message outside and a message inside, and those messages are the same, like the pat and thud of two heartbeats, one within you, one surrounding. The message of the lullaby is that it’s okay to dim the eyes for a time, to lose sight of yourself as you sleep and as you grow: if you drift, it says, you’ll drift ashore: if you fall, you will fall into place.
Don’t you dare say these times are hollowJust because there are storms raging by.Just lay low on your pillow,Close your eyes and say goodbyeTo the world that you lived in today.Let your dreams carry you away;You lived a nightmare all through the day,It is time to dream, so don’t delay.You searched for a reason to live,Yes darling, you searched everywhere.You had to push, you had to strive,It is time now to get some air.You searched in all that is outside,It is time now to look inside,Cause that is where you’ll findA reason worth keeping in your mind.These dreams are not an escape, darling,You need time to see past the lies that blind you.It is time for you to start runningTo those things that are true.So, don’t you dare say these nights are hollow,Just because there are storms raging by.Just lay low on your pillowAnd lose yourself in this lullaby.