Last Summer (Tracks in the Dust) Lyrics

These aren't tears upon my face

Just tracks in the dust I can't erase

The black leaves were falling all around my home

And then the red sun brought the dawn

We'd been in drought round here for years

Though we never surrendered to our fears

The creeks had dried up and my crops were brown

And then the smoke clouds ringed our town

Last summer I watched in vain as my country burned

And the winds from the western plains made the red dust churn

And I'll never forget the sound of those raging fires

As the flames rose higher in the night

If these skies could only cry

Like the tears that are falling from your eyes

Would it make the rivers run again

Or just bring blood red rain

But now the thunder drums the plains

And the paddocks turn green under the rain

But how do we remember those who sacrificed

All that anyone can pay?

Last summer I watched in pain as the storms rolled in

As the winds from the ocean brought the rains again

And I couldn’t comfort my children's cries

As the lightning cracked across the skies

In the ashes of my home I stand

Sifting broken memories through my hands

And shattered dreams about a wide brown land

Whose terror has stolen all my plans

From fire to floods our country turns

It's a pattern we never seem to learn

The brutal lessons that this ancient land

Fails to make us understand

Last summer I watched again while our leaders spurned

All the facts and the wisdom that they should have learned

So why should we listen as they try to pacify

The fears their ignorance derived

Well these are tears upon my face

They're cracks in my soul I can't erase

I used to have a future but now my home is gone

And still the red sun brings the dawn

Last summer I watched in vain as my country burned

And the winds from the western plains made the red dust churn

But will we understand when the next droughts rise

That we're building a road to our demise.