Ben's Songs

One of the wonderful things about Persephone is that She is a many-faced goddess who means different things to different people.  Vixy's original song uses the myth of Persephone to tell a story that's deeply personal to her.  For myself, I felt moved to borrow the tune to capture what Persephone means to me as a devotee — but that's something that has changed over time.  When I first began working on this song during the intensely initiatory Year of Madness, it came out quite different, not just lyrically but theologically.  I had to set the half-written song aside for a long time and come back and finish it when I knew Her — and myself — a great deal better.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Persephone" by Michelle Dockrey

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In Jewish tradition, opinions differ as to what real plant (if any) the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Bad represents, or what real historical development (if any) the eating of its fruit represents — some say it's basic sentience or moral self-awareness, others suggest a technological change such as the development of agriculture.

I'm firmly of the opinion that Eve made the right choice — that G!d's experiment and our story as modern humans doesn't properly begin until we eat the Fruit of Knowledge, and that this story is ours to try to turn towards the good (we're not doing so great right now), not to reject.

In this song, I imagine that each Fruit on the Tree of Knowledge is different — a different flavor moral awareness. Some are sweet, some are bitter, and some are outright poisonous. If Eve wasn't wrong to eat of the Tree in the first place, certainly Cain was wrong to keep on eating the particular fruit he picked after that bitter first bite — and that, I think, is the crack in the world and the beginning of the main thread of Genesis: brother quarreling with brother to win father's favor, until finally we meet two brothers, Ephraim and Menashe, about whom almost nothing is written because they do not quarrel so there is no drama to write about.

lyrics and music by Benjamin Newman

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ttto: "Hearthfire" by Ada Palmer

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In the book of Genesis, after working for 20 years pasturing his uncle Laban's sheep, Jacob hatches a plot to acquire his fair share of the flock for himself, through... genetic engineering?  In context it's clear that this is regarded, not as a divine miracle, but as how the ancients thought genetics actually worked.

lyrics by Benjamin Newman based on Genesis 30:25-43

ttto: "Cows with Guns" by Dana Lyons

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lyrics by Benjamin Newman

ttto: "Down Under" by Colin Hay and Ron Stryker

lyrics and music by Benjamin Newman