Castaway Dreams

[michelej1]

Before UTS was released, when they showed the Track List on Amazon and I saw Castaway Dreams, I thought the phrase was taken from a poem by Susan Dickinson. Since Lindsey was familiar with Emily Dickinson, I assumed that he might have come across Susan's work too and that her poem Hyssop was the inspiration for his song title.

After I heard the song, I didn't see any connection. But it was interesting for me to read the poem and try to guess at the meaning of Lindsey's song, before I'd even heard it. The words to Susan's poem are:

Hyssop

Lives burned by grief and sin,
Barred close from warmth and light
Visions of beauty win,
Thro fancy's magic night.

Spent souls at close of fray
Shorn of all gifts but pain.
Shrink from the narrow Way -
And gaze at day again -

In thews of grinding ice.
Fast in its death cold seams,
Of warmth and sunny skies,
The Arctic castaway dreams.

No instant's flash & gleam,
No brief reprieve from pain,
Or lapse in honey dazey dream
For those whom Love hath slain