He’s dead, Jim.
He’s gone and died.
He’s croaked off,
I don’t know why.
Some weird disease we’ve found
Has put him six feet down.
Cremation
Has claimed him.
He’s dead, Jim.
“He’s Dead, Jim,” an early song by Julia Ecklar, which is… pretty much what it says on the tin.
Lyrics, chords, and sheet music are included in the Traveller Songbook, which is available for free download from Prometheus Music as a scanned PDF.
It’s the voice that’s always breaking
That never learns to scan.
It’s the song of grim war-making
The ever-crying man.
It’s the one who won’t be cheerful
Who cannot find the tune.
And the fan, afraid of smiling
Who sings of wreck and ruin.
Nineteen young women asleep in their bunks
But one up on deck here with me
She’s watching the stars with the wind in hair
And she tells me her name is Marie
No stranger to laughter, no stranger to joy
And a spirit as wild as the sea
She’ll make a man happy in distant Quebec
But he won’t be a sailor like me
“Fille Du Roy” by Heather Dale, with heartfelt sign language interpretation by Thurga Kanagasekarampillai.
Here’s some historical context from Heather Dale’s note on the video:
Four hundred years ago, the colony [of Quebec] was thriving but pioneering families were few. The French King Louis XIV did something surprisingly progressive: he offered to formally adopt any orphaned French young women of marriageable age (legally making them princesses), provided they were willing to travel to New France and marry whomever they wanted… Over 700 brave young ladies took the plunge, and were treated with huge respect.
This is part of a really cool project that Heather Dale is collaborating on with Deaf storytellers. For more videos from the series, check out Heather’s YouTube Channel.
Inspired by this post. Lyrics credit goes to everyone who contributed, I just made it scan. Three cheers to @goodqueenalys, and I hope it was OK I made a recording!
Please don’t ask me to smile
Please don’t tell me to cheer up
This is my face and it isn’t your place to tell me how I should use it No don’t ask me to smile Because it isn’t kind it’s creepy I just wanna be me Angry, sad or carefree and I’m fine with me So I don’t see a need to excuse it
“Smile!” by the PDX Broadsides, a song in response to a directive that most of us who’ve ever been gendered as female have had to deal with at some point.
Outside of our town, at the edge of the forest
Two roads come together, they call it Fey Cross
And there at the crossroads, away from the roadside
There’s an odd mound of granite all covered with moss
Oh, soft is the pillow, all green and inviting
Sweet is the sound of a new faery tune
But beware of the voices that call you to sleep there
That call you to dream ‘neath the light of the moon.
“Song of Fey Cross,” a warning song written by Gwen Knighton and performed by Three Weird Sisters (Gwen Knighton, Brenda Sutton, and Teresa Powell).
Well, I hope you don’t mind me interrupting you miss
What’s a girl like you doing on a planet like this?
I really wouldn’t mind spending time with you
My name might be Solo, but I’m built for two
A little bit o’ booze, a little bit o’ nookie
And a little joy ride with a seven-foot Wookie
Gonna run
It’s more convenient to label us the dissidents
So you can sleep at night
We are the symptom things are more rotten
Than they are black and white
“DMZ” by Leslie Hudson, a song for the Maquis. Leslie writes in the song description: “The idea of mutiny so alien to TNG but central to DS9 & VOY demonstrates a fundamental shift in Trek philosophy. What glistens on the surface is suspect. Look deeper.”
Initially I wrote this intending it to be a sweet song about going home to space, but the original song is about the aftermath of a failed and bloody uprising, and it didn’t lend itself too well to happy. I wrote the current version thinking of the Alderaanian (and Jedhan and Hosnian…) refugees in Star Wars, but it could be applied to any number of science fiction universes, really.
