Lyrics - Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young - Wooden Ships Lyrics

Wooden Ships Lyrics - Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

by David Crosby, Stephen Stills, Paul Kantner

Stills: If you smile at me, I will understand
'Cause that is something everybody everywhere does
in the same language.
Crosby: I can see by your coat, my friend,
you're from the other side,
There's just one thing I got to know,
Can you tell me please, who won?
Stills: Say, can I have some of your purple berries?
Crosby: Yes, I've been eating them for six or seven weeks now,
haven't got sick once.
Stills: Probably keep us both alive.

Wooden ships on the water, very free and easy,
Easy, you know the way it's supposed to be,
Silver people on the shoreline, let us be,
Talkin' 'bout very free and easy...
Horror grips us as we watch you die,
All we can do is echo your anguished cries,
Stare as all human feelings die,
We are leaving - you don't need us.

Go, take your sister then, by the hand,
lead her away from this foreign land,
Far away, where we might laugh again,
We are leaving - you don't need us.

And it's a fair wind, blowin' warm,
Out of the south over my shoulder,
Guess I'll set a course and go...

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Thanks to Claudia S for submitting Wooden Ships Lyrics.

Yes, civil and any/all wars. | Reviewer: deboe | 5/9/13

Also, the song is of the timeless tragedy of all wars and of watching a fellow combatant die in front of you and surviving and trying to live life. Like the beeping at the end......any thing else you see/imagine/hear, is also there. I guarantee it. If a movie plays in your mind that will be it. That is what the 60's, 70's were about now, isn't it? PAX.

CIVIL WAR | Reviewer: deboe | 5/9/13

I know I read or heard it is the civil war and wonder if it is over. They encounter a young victim of the war, bleeding, dyeing, in his own unquessing horror and they need to leave him for dead as "you don't need us" which echoes the death of war. The wooden ships are the ships of the civil war era of course. And, what you all said too!.

At the end of the song, there is a kind of morse code | Reviewer: Sixties Survivor | 3/30/13

The morse code "beeping" at the end of the song remind me of a movie that was out in the early sixties about a nuclear holocaust. I think the code signified that the message was being sent out electronically. No was was sending the message, nor was anyone receiving the message. Only a few people were left after a nuclear holocaust. I think they were on some deserted island or some remote place that had escaped the destruction. The last scene is of a beach. Does anyone else remember this movie?

one of the greatest songs of the 60s? | Reviewer: AlO | 8/31/12

I still love the melody, harmonies and lyrics - it always made me think that soldiers are ordered to kill each other for no real personal reasons - they are all pawns of opposing governments.
The song itself brings some sadness to me though, because it reminds of the '60s and '70s, when I was obviously younger and more free spirited.

Layers of music layers of meaning | Reviewer: oaktreeforest51 | 6/1/12

I'm aware of what Croz said the song is about ... but ... if your like me and your mind slides over the Horror verses and the Silver people reference this can have a lot of other meanings ... very rich freedom loving, tribal, Callenbach-ecotopian, alternative to the mechanistic life and for a natural one. Not to mention the feel of that sound, truly a classic bit of music.

Ben is right | Reviewer: Usul | 5/14/12

Reviewer: ben | 7/13/09, I think got it right. The song is about giving up on the American Government and their war mongering. But I thought the line was "Silver Eagle on the shoreline, let us be." There aren't any Silver People.

We don't smile in the same language. | Reviewer: Ed | 4/30/12

As much as I love this song, I have to comment, we don't smile the same, in the same language. Asians -particularly Japanese - see the "eyes locked on, wide toothy American grin" as an aggressive threat, not a friendly gesture. When I first came to America fifty years ago, I was five, and frightened by all these big, unfriendly, threatening Americans. Today, I know that many of those folks that scared me back then,were trying to be friendly. But it took me many years to grasp that, on more than an intellectual level.
But I see this as a post-apocalyptic song...survivors picking up the pieces after the rubble is cooled. There were still ruins and damage in Japan, when I left in 1962 to come to America.

Cube1 | Reviewer: Anonymous | 7/28/11

The apocolypse and the trappings of society are one in the same in this song. On the surface the "Silver People" do represent radiation suits but there is also a nod to the replacement of cultural enlightenment with cosumerism (they chose Silver as opposed to Tin). "Horror grips us as we watch you die" is much more than observing the aftermath of a nuclear war, it is also an observation on the void and split in country during the late '60s.

interesting comments! | Reviewer: SacDuck | 6/30/11

Hey I still have the LP and remember listening to it several times and just looked it up to see Jay pretty much nailed it. But I find it crazy insane that all of us are here using this incredible tool yet look at folks that used their imaginations instead of google!
Bravo

sweet harmony | Reviewer: william | 3/20/11

being a Veitnam Vet. I don't have any special feelings for the lyrics, I do like the harmonies and the melody, Great strokes and layering- that's the hook with all thier stuff,too bad they couldn't hold it together longer.

berries on a wooden boat | Reviewer: petr999 | 3/12/11

Sounded ike nothing outstading to me.
Lyrics resembled me
'The Blue Lagoon (1980 film)'
as it ends, the guys are leaving in a wooden boat eating berries willing to sleep, perhaps forever.
Kind of inspiration after reading wikipedia on who are the Crosby, Still, etc. the where I noted the song made an influence itself.
The more it resembles the film at they are on a Caribean basin.
Such a silent protest looks ridiculous as the most clashing is 'just doing nothing', kind of unmotivated schoolchildren's behavior, but perhaps was the best of the possible doings at the moment the song was issued.

Civil War reference | Reviewer: CivilDiva | 2/15/11

This is about the Civil War...shoreline, berries (soldiers ate a lot of them). Blue coat vs. Grey coat, north and south...wind blowing from the south...many ships were in the harbor at that time and as soldier made their way up, they saw them.

Wooden Ships | Reviewer: PAF | 7/3/10

This song is a protest song about the Vietnam war.

basically the gist of the song is simple to understand.
It's about two soldiers from different sides bumping into each other after a nuclear war. They kinda used imagery of peaceful ships made of wood versus the backdrop of a nuclear war...

Their point of course is that we needed to end the Vietnam war before that became a reality and there weren't many people left.

Wooden Ships | Reviewer: Mike | 1/25/10

it's about a soldier that's been in the woods post vietnam war and he comes across another person (vietnamese) and the line "i can see by your coat,my friend, you're from the other side", it's referring to the uniform. "can you tell me please, who won?" it's common fact that a lot of soliders were so deep in the jungle and own their own, they had no idea the war had ended.

My thoughts on the song | Reviewer: Mike | 1/7/10

I think its when the world turns to liquid sh@#, these guys hop in their wooden sailboat, and leave society, to return unharmed, to see the horror, and the government standing on the shoreline, and the guys turning around and leaving again. Sounds like a good plan, sign me up, i'd like a 42' Hunter myself.

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