"Bless the Wings (That Bring You Back)"
The last three lines of the bridge are "The dust of many centuries / Has blown across this land / But love will not be scattered like the sand." These are fairly similar to the bridge of "Lovely to See You" from On the Threshold of a Dream: "Tell us what you've seen in faraway forgotten lands / Where empires have turned back to sand." There are a number of similarities here: both songs were written by Justin Hayward; both of these sections are bridges; and both rhyme "land(s)" with "sand."
A couple months ago I wrote a post about the bridge in "Lovely to See You" and postulated that it might have been influenced by Percy Bysshe Shelley's poem "Ozymandias," which has the same image of a domain erased by sand and even the same land/sand rhyme. This same image appearing again in "Bless the Wings" (although this time with love surviving) could be coincidental, or it might be Hayward's revisiting either his older song or Shelley's poem.
A couple months ago I wrote a post about the bridge in "Lovely to See You" and postulated that it might have been influenced by Percy Bysshe Shelley's poem "Ozymandias," which has the same image of a domain erased by sand and even the same land/sand rhyme. This same image appearing again in "Bless the Wings" (although this time with love surviving) could be coincidental, or it might be Hayward's revisiting either his older song or Shelley's poem.
"Once Is Enough"
A year or two ago I noticed that the Moody Blues reference themselves at the beginning of the second verse. According to the lyrics printed in the liner notes:
Listening to the song again recently, I noticed something besides this allusion. The first line is "Just ask me once," and it's sung by a single voice. The second line is "Don't ask me twice," and it's sung by two voices. In those two lines, the number of voices singing is a musical representation of the "once" and "twice."
Sometimes you're firstDays of Future Passed is the title of the Moody Blues' second album.
Sometimes you're last
Then again you're somewhere
In your "days of future passed"
Listening to the song again recently, I noticed something besides this allusion. The first line is "Just ask me once," and it's sung by a single voice. The second line is "Don't ask me twice," and it's sung by two voices. In those two lines, the number of voices singing is a musical representation of the "once" and "twice."
