Hand on My Back - Mary Chapin Carpenter

I move through the world like an arrow that flies

Slicing the air as I’m mapping the skies

And way deep down the echoes remain

Memories sounding like rattling chains

But lately I think I am coming around

I’m liking the feel of my feet on the ground

And last night I stopped dead in these tracks

Recalling your hand on the small of my back

The slightest brush but as powerful too

As an electrical storm that’s moving on through

Then is gone as fast as it came, leaving nothing,

Not even the rain

When I was younger how I took my time

Folly and wisdom form points on a line

From one to another with space in between

For the lessons you learn &the dreams that you dream

But tell me what happens when dreams don’t come true

How you overcome some things until they overtake you

Why you never got chosen, why you never felt claimed

By some passion or person that is never explained

I come on quiet but I’m fierce as a lion

Life will take us apart but we never stop trying

To proceed as if whole and intact

Like I felt with your hand on my back

Nothing can catch me when I’m moving fast

Even those rattling chains of the past

So I’ll go like that arrow but with nowhere to land

I am losing velocity, height and command

We all hit the ground, we all fall from the sky

We burn up, we break up, we wreck and we cry

But we’re bound up together by sight and by pact

That begins with the touch of your hand on my back