Chords for The Cleansing by John Trudell

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_ [E] _ _ [Ab] _ _ _
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_ [C] _ _ _ [Ab] Little daughter, you are so small for a big woman, so soft for someone who must be so strong. _
Little [A] daughter, I [Db] hold you in my arms, I [Bb] laugh and am happy at your baby girl smile.
To [Fm] say I feel good is not enough.
Little [Ab] daughter, I walk with you through the dimension called time, [B] for what are [C] minutes,
days or years [F] compared to father-daughter places in eternity. _
[Ab] Little daughter, you the delicate infant [A] child carry the innocent reality. _
I pray for your [Bm] protection, prayers to [C] help you through this life experience.
Little daughter, the times I hold you next to me, I am flowing in infinity of love [Ab] to
fill the times I cannot [Eb] hold you next to me.
Little daughter, [Cm] I am always with you, even [F] when you cannot see me there.
[C] _
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[Ab] Sister, sister, I want to talk to the woman [E] in you.
[Ab] We are under siege in a troubled time.
Sister, sister, won't you hear my voice?
I am your brother, [F] but I have made the mistakes of a man.
_ [C] Sometimes it is lonely being a man.
[C]
The programming has its effect.
_ Isolation is such a cruel thing.
Sister, sister, won't you [A] understand?
They [Ab] took your brothers, turned them into men, like they took our sisters, turned them into women.
[Ab] Sister, sister, we [Abm] are all the family of earth.
[C] They have taken us away [C] in their nuclear war, taught us to compete and abuse and blame each
other [Abm] while we are all being used.
_ [Ab]
Sister, sister, hear my heart.
[C] It is time to bring the family back.
[Cm] Together we must remember _ _ what life is all about.
Sister, sister, I am your brother.
Every time I have ever hurt you, I have always hurt myself.
Sister, sister, hear my voice.
It is all [C] up to us.
We have a [Ab] choice. _ _
_ _ _ _ Crystal clear tears [Cm] of salt come when my heart talks with sadness.
_ The tears flow my emotional rivers.
It is no damn use to pretend.
Pain will not rise again.
_ Crystal clear tears of salt help my heart to feel for something when I do not want to.
Clear my vision, see my peace.
Men don't cry.
Indians are stoic.
I tell that to my heart, my eyes.
They just laugh at [Eb] me.
And sometimes when my spirit hurts, [C] they make me cry.
Crystal clear tears of salt purify my memory.
[Eb] Help me understand [C] this is not the [Ab] beginning nor the end. _
[Fm] _ _ _ _ _ _
For my children, to the people I can talk, when it comes to you, I know what to say.
It is I just don't know how.
I [Cm] love you.
That is not a question.
Showing it has been confusing.
My life has drifted all ways.
[C] Somehow I can just never stay.
_ I've rationalized I'm headed [Ab] to a goal.
Yet sometimes my heart hears me running to a future, always from the past.
I love you.
Don't want you hurt.
I want you to realize your potential.
I've always been afraid to interfere.
My bias, my prejudice, my doubt, the weaker sides of me.
I had to protect you, make you [C] stronger.
[Cm] Compassion is to be your companion as you head to your destiny.
I've tried the only way I knew.
Please try to understand.
I didn't know what else to do.
[Gm] And I love you.
[C] _ _ _ _ _
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_ [Ab] _ _ _ _ _
[G] _ _ _ _ _ _
[Ab] _ Yesterday's laughter is the balance for today.
Today's tears are the cleansing for tomorrow.
We started out so long ago.
There was no one to teach us what we had to know.
The days were ours.
The times, they were extreme.
We did our best and we did our worst in the constant struggle to [Am] understand why.
[Fm] Illusions and fantasies [C] battering us, teaching us the hard way, forcing us to find a right [Ab] way.
Shelter and comfort coming where we found it.
Constantly moving, it was like being chased by something we did not understand.
Many are the times we could have just laid down and died, but the will of life helped us to survive.
[Fm] As we traveled through life with [Ab] yesterday's laughter, the balance for today.
And [C] today's tears, a cleansing for [Ab] tomorrow. _
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Young ones, listen.
_ Remember who we are.
Remember where we are.
Do not take the word of America.
Listen to them as in caution.
Live among them as in surrounded.
Live not as they live.
[G] Live to appreciate. _
Seconds ago in eternity, ancient ones decided.
[Ab] Way before wounded spirits, dreams shattering under aggression.
_ Earth is mother.
We are children.
The [C] protection is our innocence.
[Ab] Seconds ago it was decided.
We are the middle of forever.
Look for your medicine.
There is a white world gone mad, [Eb] thinking protection is in force.
_ [Ab] Greed, the machine, preys on them, but they will not admit it or do anything about it.
They have [E] no medicine, with backs [C] turned on children and [Cm] elders.
They do not even care for [E] air or water [F] or [Ab] land or life.
Too confused to care.
There's no way to live.
Young ones, listen.
[Eb] Remember who you [Gb] are.
Remember [C] where you are.
Remember why you are.
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