From the recording Banishment
Mark Barnett and I co-wrote this song. We started with a melody from Mark and I kind of asked him questions on what he wanted to say. Then I somehow modified the melody ever so slightly and we ended up with a song we are both proud of and one which neither of us are sure exactly who wrote what. San Giulio is a small island in the Italian lakes where migrating swallows arrive every year.
Lyrics
The Bells Of San Giulio
See them swallows
Flown a thousand miles
To skim upon this water
That rises to meet their dives
Through the bell tower
Of San Giulio’s skies
Their calls ring out
Where the isle of silence lies
Pay the boatman
To leave the world behind
All our sorrows
On that far shoreline
You and me together again
Again we swoop and dive
Into the water
Surrounded by our lives
We cry these tears of freedom
There’s something she denies
Didn’t think that we could ever feel the same
Or that we could ever rise
Into San Giulio’s skies
San Giulio’s skies
We walk this road of silence
In the evening light
Where pilgrims stoop and pray
And swallows turn to flight
The darkness closing
The island’s lost from sight
Vesper bells and Matins
That ring around the night
We cry these tears of freedom
There’s something she denies
Didn’t think that we could ever feel the same
Or that we could ever rise
Into San Giulio’s skies
San Giulio’s skies
© The Bells Of San Giulio words & music by Mark Barnett & Thomas Yule Fairnie 26th April 2004