Childlike Faith In Childhoods End chords by Van Der Graaf Generator

Chords with lyrics

from the album Still Life (1976).
Transcribed by Cory ([email protected]), 2010

[G+G C majorC D MajorD  C majorC BB D MajorD   C majorC BB]  F#dimF#dim AbdimAbdim
Existence is a stage on which we pass,
[AbAb A augmentedA  BB  C majorC   BB  A augmentedA  BB] D MajorD
a sleepwalk trick for mind and heart;
   D MajorD      G+G           FF
it's hopeless, I know, but onward I must go
 FF        E MajorE
and try to make a start

n.C.
at seeing something more
      E MajorE               D MajorD
than day to day survival, chased by final death.
            G+G               FF
if I believed this the sum of the life to which we've come,
          E minorEm
I wouldn't waste my breath.
A minorAm
Somehow, there must be more.

B minorBm  G+G

C majorC   Csus4Csus4    C majorC            E MajorE
There was a time when more was felt than known
              D MajorD
but now, entrenched inside my sett,
       G+G                 FF
in light more mundane, thought rattles round my brain:
           E minorEm
we live, we die...and yet?


Riff 1:
 D MajorD C majorC  D MajorD C majorC  D MajorD C majorC E MajorE C majorC D MajorD C majorC A augmentedA
--------------------------------|
--------------------------------|
--7-5---7-5---7-5-9--5--7-5-2---|
--7-5---7-5---7-5-9--5--7-5-2---|
--5-3---5-3---5-3-7--3--5-3-0---|
--------------------------------|

Riff 1
In the beginning there was order and destiny
but now that path has reached the border and on our knees
is no way to face the future, whatever it be.

A minorAm        G+G        FF
Though the forces which hold us in place
       A minorAm    G+G    FF
last through eons in unruffled grace
FF         E MajorE
we, too, wear the face of creation.

Riff 1
As anti-matter sucks and pulses periodically
the bud unfolds, the bloom is dead, all space is living history.
It seems as though time must betray us yet we're alive
and though I see no God to save us, yet we survive

DmDm              A7A7
through the centuries of progress
DmDm           Bb majorBb
which don't get us very far.
A7A7  DmDm           A7A7
All illusion! All is bogus...
DmDm           Bb majorBb   G minorGm  A augmentedA
we don't yet know what we are.

Riff 1
Laughing, hoping, praying, joking, Son of Man,
with lowered eyes but lifting hearts, we're grains of sand
and though, in time, the sea may claim us for its own
we are the rocks which root the future - on us it grows!

DmDm               A7A7
We might not be there to share it
DmDm       Bb majorBb  A7A7  DmDm          A7A7
if eternity's a jest but I think that I can bear it
DmDm           Bb majorBb   G minorGm  A augmentedA
if the next life is the best.

(riff 1 with solo's)

4:17
| C#C# | F#F# | C#C# | F#F# |
| FF | Bb majorBb | C majorC | FF

G+G  A minorAm      G+G        FF
Even if there is a heaven when we die,
    A minorAm        G+G         FF
endless bliss would be as meaningless as the lie
      A minorAm       G+G
that always comes as answer to the question
FF             E7E7
"Why do we see through the eyes of creation?"


B minorBm D MajorD F#susF#sus F# minorF#m [D MajorD E MajorE] Bsus4Bsus4 [D MajorD C majorC] Asus4Asus4


B minorBm        F# minorF#m
Adrift without a course,
   [D MajorD E MajorE] Bsus4Bsus4 B minorBm
it's very lonely here,
     Asus4Asus4
our only conjecture
   A augmentedA        B minorBm     F# minorF#m
what lies behind the dark.
F# minorF#m        E minorEm
Still, I find I can cling to a lifeline,
B minorBm               Esus4Esus4       E minorEm
think of a lifetime which means more than my own one,
Esus4Esus4    E minorEm    Bm7Bm7     B minorBm
dreams of a grander thing than we are.

[C#C# D MajorD]  F# minorF#m    E minorEm
Time and Space hang heavy on my shoulders...
B minorBm          [G+G A augmentedA] E7sus4E7sus4
when all life is over who can say
    E minorEm        Bsus4Bsus4   BB    E MajorE
no mutated force shall remain?


E MajorE            B7B7 F# minorF#m   B7B7
Though the towers of the city
E MajorE        B7B7 F# minorF#m B7B7
are denied to we men of clay
E MajorE           B7B7  F# minorF#m B7B7   F# minorF#m Ab7Ab7
still we know we shall scale the heights some day.
Ab7Ab7        (E MajorE)
Frightened in the silence, frightened, but
A augmentedA    E/G# E MajorE  BB
thinking ve - ry  hard,
E MajorE        B7B7 F# minorF#m B7B7   E MajorE
let us make computations of the stars.


E MajorE BB E MajorE

[Instrumental section]


Riff 1
Older, wiser, sadder, blinder, watch us run:
faster, longer, harder, stronger, now it comes...
colour blisters, image splinters gravitate
towards the centre, in final splendour disintegrate.

DmDm         A7A7
The universe now beckons
DmDm            Bb majorBb
and Man, too, must take His place;
A7A7   DmDm         A7A7
just a few last fleeting seconds
DmDm        Bb majorBb  G minorGm   A augmentedA
to wander in the waste,

    A minorAm        G+G        FF
and the children who were ourselves move on,
    A minorAm         G+G       FF
reincarnation stills its now perfected song,
   A minorAm      G+G      FF    Bsus4Bsus4  BB
and at last we are free of the bonds of creation.

E MajorE         BB    E MajorE          BB
All the jokers and gaolers, all the junkies and slavers too,
E MajorE            BB       Ab7Ab7
all the throng who have danced a merry tune...
Ab7Ab7     E MajorE          A augmentedA    E/G# E MajorE  BB
human we can all be, but Humanity we must rise above,
E MajorE         BB         E MajorE
in the name of all faith and hope and love.


E MajorE           BB     E MajorE         BB
There's a time for all pilgrims, and a time for the fakers too,
E MajorE          BB             Ab7Ab7
there's a time when we all will stand alone and nude,
Ab7Ab7     E MajorE           A augmentedA  E/G# E MajorE   BB
naked to the galaxies...naked, but clothed in the overview:
E MajorE            BB      E MajorE
as we reach Childhood's End we start anew.

     E MajorE       BB
And though dark is the highway,
E MajorE            BB
and the peak's distance breaks my heart,
E MajorE         BB            Ab7Ab7
for I never shall see it, still I play my part,
            E MajorE
believing that what waits for us
       A augmentedA     E/G#   E MajorE   BB
is the cosmos compared to the dust of the past.
E MajorE          BB         E MajorE