Today, March 14, is Pi Day, so let's listen to "The Circle Game."

[mahatmakanejeeves]

We'll start with Buffy Sainte Marie, who has been in the news recently.

Buffy Sainte Marie - The Circle Game (Columbia University protests of 1968)
10,822 views Oct 26, 2018

sonice57
8.18K subscribers

Buffy Sainte-Marie performing "The Circle Game" for the 1970 movie "The Strawberry Statement".

The Strawberry Statement is a 1970 cult film about the counterculture and student revolts of the 1960s, loosely based on the non-fiction book by James Simon Kunen about the Columbia University protests of 1968.

Lyrics :

Yesterday a child came out to wonder
Caught a dragonfly inside a jar
Fearful when the sky was full of thunder
And tearful at the falling of a star

Then the child moved ten times round the seasons
Skated over ten clear frozen streams
Words like, when you're older, must appease him
And promises of someday make his dreams

And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
We're captive on the carousel of time

We can't return we can only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game

Sixteen springs and sixteen summers gone now
Cartwheels turn to car wheels thru the town
And they tell him,
Take your time, it won't be long now
Till you drag your feet to slow the circles down

So the years spin by and now the boy is twenty
Though his dreams have lost some grandeur coming true
There'll be new dreams, maybe better dreams and plenty
Before the last revolving year is through

And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down

We're captive on the carousel of time
We can't return, we can only look behind
From where we came
And go round and round and round
In the circle game

Joni Mitchell - The Circle Game
229,891 views May 24, 2017

Jan Hammer
73K subscribers

In this poetic song, Joni Mitchell tells the story of a child's journey to adulthood. She uses a carousel as a metaphor for the years that go by, pointing out how we can look back, but we can't return to our past.

The song opens with the young boy enjoying the wonder of youth, but looking forward to getting older. In the second verse, he is 16 and driving. The final verse finds him at 20, with his dreams tempered a bit, but still with high hopes for his future.

This was partly written in response to Neil Young's song about lost innocence "Sugar Mountain," where Young sings, "You can't be 20 on Sugar Mountain." Mitchell's last verse is a rejoinder of sorts, with the 20-year-old facing diminished dreams but still with plenty of hope.

Young and Mitchell are both from Canada and met in the mid-'60s.

Mon Mar 14, 2022: Today, March 14, is Pi Day.