Sixteen
words and music by Mary Karlzen

My mother she wrote of the seashells, seagulls and the big crashing waves
She whispered, “these are the memories with your Dad I’d like to save”
Then a summer wind came crashing in and I never did know what to say
Cause I never heard her speak of him and hide her tears in exactly that way

And now the past to me is a memory of an exploding sky
As we lay in the dark in the park on our backs
It was the fourth of July

The grass was cold wet and green
And only sixteen

The teenage girls would gather and the teenage boys would scatter through town
But there was this one and he smiled like the sun
So we did hang around some
One night we walked down to the river and now I’ll never be the same
And if I try real hard maybe I could remember his name

Anthony and pat were playing on the tracks
When the train came by that day
And I watched the life run out of my friends as they carried them away cold wet and green