Kitchen Heroes
Words and music by & © Talis Kimberley 1.6.2005

Funny how the heroes change
My childhood knights, you'd find it strange
To occupy the daydreams I have now
Sure you ride a white horse, wave a sword,
And pledge your honour to some liege lord,
But when you've spilled your blood and made your vow...

Someone rubbed the horse down and got the creature fed
Someone set the table and someone made the bed,
Someone cleaned the boots and fixed the tack, washed the clothes, and put it all back
With a flask of something good and strong that was brewed last year when the nights were long

Mistress Quickly, hold my hand
When things get bad in this promised land
Till we learn to live within our means again
It's the stock and the cellar and the hearth and the hive
Will decide who falls and who survives
And we're going to need our kitchen heroes then

So you can shoot a gun and wield a knife.
But there's more than that to the kind of life
That occupies the daydreams I have now
Do you know which tree's bark dulls the pain,
Whether heartsease lives up to its name,
And if you don't know yet, can you learn how?

(Can you) sterilise the bandages and check the meat is sound?
Tan a hide for a winter shoe and store roots underground –
Set the bread to rise and butter to come, the cheese to set, the honey to run
Smoke the meat with skill and care and keep us fed // when the cupboard is bare?

Bread rise, butter come; stone grind, river run
Barley brew and oats to spare, keep us fed when the cupboard’s bare

Elizabeth David, hold my hand
When things get bad in this promised land
Till we learn to live within our means again
It's the stock and the cellar and the hearth and the hive
Will decide who falls and who survives
And we're going to need our kitchen heroes then

Sancho Panza, lead me through
I'm afraid we're all relying on you
And the windmill-building starts this afternoon
It's the stock and the cellar and the hearth and the hive
Will decide who falls and who survives
And we're going to need our kitchen heroes soon

Website design by Weyrd Media (c) 2009
All content (c) Talis Kimberley and Marchwood Media