Howard Goodall
There She Goes
[PAULA PAXTON]
There she goes, there she goes
Full of fear, full of rage
Far from here from the cage of my heart
And it’s only the start

Off she sails, off she sails
Sad and lost, like a ship
Tempers tossed in the grip of the storm
True to type and to form

And there’s nothing, no nothing we mothers can possibly say
All our weeping and wailing
Won’t ever dissuade them
From sailing away

But hey, there I go
There I go
Scheming schemes for a life
Which it seems has a life of its own
As she goes it alone

Look at me, look at me
Making free with her pain
Saying, “see how much pain could be spared
If that pain could be shared.”
When there’s nothing, no nothing
We mothers can offer, I know
And our children grow colder and surer
The stronger and older they grow
And so
There they go, see them go
Far too fast to resist
With one last tiny twist of the knife
Taking half of your life

There she goes, there she goes
On the run, like her Dad
Well, that’s one I can add to my woes
And I doubt if she knows
Of the hurts that I hide as the truth starts to dawn
That a river has dried, that a story has drawn to a close

And she goes, off she goes
Where she goes, which is anyone’s guess
And she’ll need less and less of her mother the further she goes
There she goes
There she blows
There she goes

But godspeed and god bless her forever, wherever she goes
There she goes
There she goes