On my way home from an excursion that brought me close to the great river that is so close to us, and yet that we so often ignore, I heard a wonderful song on the radio. I made a special effort to remember the name and the first line of melody and looked it up as soon as I came home. It is in french and I so encourage everyone who can to look on YouTube and listen to Michel Rivard sing “Je voudrais voir la mer”. Oh, I thought everyone should know about this wonderful music and I even made an attempt to translate the beautiful lyrics. Of course it’s not possible to get the rhyme on a first draft like this but I really could not resist. The picture is not the sea, but from the ferry from Sorel to the islands across the river. Well, our great river goes to the sea so it is the best I could do. Make sure you see Michel Rivard sing this and not another artist…for the first time, at least. So, homage to him

I want to see the sea and her silver beaches
And her white cliffs proud in the wind.
I long to see the sea and her moon birds
Her steeds of mist and flying fish

I want to see the sea when she is a mirror
When wooly clouds pass unobserved.
And stormy evenings in the rage of the sky
Or hear a whale call to his mate.

I long to see the sea
To dance with her and to defy death
I long to see the sea
To dance with her and to defy deal.

I want to see the sea swallow up a galleon
With its gold and cannons and to hear the laughter
Of a hundred thousand children who don’t fear the sea
And who want to live without flying a flag.

I want to see the sea and her imaginry monsters
Her canvas sails and her warships
The graveyard of sailors and her coral bed
Where sharks sleep in satin sheets.

I live in a bubble in the middle of a city.
Sometimes my heart is grey and behind the windows
I feel loneliness fall onto the pale faces
And under the heavy dragging footfalls of passers-by.

Then deep in me there arises a wind of the open spaces
As powerful as the storm, as soft as love
And the ocean calls me with a velvet voice
And draws in my body
The movement, the curve of a wave.

I long to see the sea
To dance with her to defy death.
I long to see the sea
To dance with her to defy death.

I want to see the sea swell with the sun
And become a jewel as large as the earth.
I want to see the sea swell with the sun
And become a jewel as large as the earth.