This is sad but beautiful. Love the sparse backing, wonderful forlorn cello, meaningful lyrics, great main vocal and great harmonies.

Very powerful song and cello and vocal harmonies are perfect additions. Very good and I will listen again.

Lovely piano work, such a nice intro. The cello is so, so nice - simply perfect! Nicely sung, simple but gorgeous melody. Such a sad story many ways, but I was filled with a sense of hope in your song. What a great collab among your group!

Mmmm. You've captured the angst and loneliness of these lyrics. the minor key really works. The cello is a brilliant addition. What a wonderful mega-collab. Great harmonies, too. Thanks for commenting on Vintage Vinyl. That's what brought me to your page where I got hear this lovely song.

Such a tender sweet song. Beautiful lyric that hits home for anyone who has experienced a significant loss. And this is a heartfelt, no, heart-wrenching vocal. Truly lovely! And oh my, that cello takes this to a whole other level. (cello is my favourite string instrument) Beautiful, all of it, through and through. Thank you for sharing this wonderful collaboration with us.

Heartbreaking with a soaring bridge. Great choice to end on a half chorus, feeling even more unresolved than the already minor chord feel

I love the simplicity of this song. The accompaniment shines and so do the vocals. Good writing to boot! It's a peaceful listen. Great job all!

This starts out feeling like a portrait of so many marriages a decade or two in, where things have chilled off and it’s easier to see how the other person seem different than how we do. Then we move into that specific heavy heartbreak this couple is carrying. The broken heartedness of the child and the brwaking heartebness of the parents. The liminal hospital spaces open up into this bridge of attempting a cure. The music carries the lyrics along in such an emotional way. Beautiful collaborations. And the male harmonies gave me hope that it’s not too late to save this couple.

Wow...just wow. The words, lyrics, music and delivery are all so emotional. The words describe in such a tender way a difficult and heart wrenching situation. Thank goodness for the bridge. The music is glorious. The piano and cello capture the essence of this story perfectly. Lovely harmonies too. Listening through for the third time. It's heavy, but a winner of song...

Achingly beautiful. I love the doubled vocals that hits so damn hard on the bridge and to a peak the second time through. The arrangement is perfect, the vocal tender and, also, perfect. This one almost hurts to listen to, in an almost good way.

So beautiful! Thanks for putting your souls into it :)

You made me cry, this is beautiful, thank you for writing it. ❤️

Achingly beautiful. Lovely harmonies, and such a tender treatments. Great lyrics. Wow.

Absolutely stunning song. The emotion of it all is just oozing through the speakers. This is giving me goosebumps.

Wow, this is stunning. I love how it develops throughout the song with the cello and harmonies becoming more prominent. Such good work from everyone involved!

Ooh I do like a sad song I do! The vocal is suitably fragile, and the cello is a great addition to the piano.

So beautiful, so heavy. Fantastic work from everyone involved. The honesty and vulnerability on full display is so visceral. Devastatingly heartbreaking with a touch of heartwarming hope.

Beautiful and haunting. I see why you needed to sit on this for awhile. It was time well taken. The piano is beautiful and let the lyrics come through. The cello line was perfect. The harmonies beautifully supported the song.Wow

really lovely song. love the arrangement and the playing throughout.

@jonmeta thank you for commenting so thoughtfully on my words, I wanted to avoid tropes for sure. The musicians I worked with are killing it with what they do, too!

@timfatchen thank you for your reflections, that means a very lot!

So so gorgeous. The sadness is palpable. The texture of the cello is beautiful and the harmony really brings it home.

There are lots of songs out there that use the tropes of sadness and loss, and often I feel manipulated: hey, this is the part where you're supposed to cry! But this song is sad because the details are so real: the house that was once new and full of hope, and now seems faded and echoing with emptiness even though we're still in it; the clinic halls: scenes painted with just a few brush strokes that let us know (and feel and identify with) the situation And the 'really smile with your eyes line' is a killer. What I like about that is that the music, mostly minor, resolves to the major root just there, as if the memory of a true smile makes it possible that it could return. The cellos, piano, voice are all perfect for this mood and message.

an extremely sad song about how domestic tragedy can impair relationships. gorgeously sung against a somber musical arrangement. the harmonies are filled with hope for healing and a united future.

What Tim said. The soft piano and languid cello evoke a sense of heavily-repressed emotions which gradually come out into the open as the arrangement opens up. This really is a powerful piece of work and it's masterfully done.

I can see and understand why it took so long to set the lyric, and why it was worth it. The combination of sadness, hope and effort comes through in this and I really don't have the words to go on. This is very, very close, indeed too close to personal experience, and it's achingly, beautifully stated in the lyric, the voices, the backing. :heartfelt" is an overused word, but it's absolutely right here. Congratulations to you all for one of the absolute best songs I've heard this FAWM. That cello line is so lovely I'll have to listen twice to follow it.

@jinx so true that this song just reaches in and twists you! As its autobiographical to me and my husband (I penned the lyrics), every time I listen, it guts me!

@stevenwesleyguiles tha is for the compliment on “really smile with your eyes”, that line perplexed me for a time.

@cts WOW. Thank you for your feedback. It really means a lot!

I can't truly express how much this song touch a spot in my heart. I'm going to agree with @stevenwesleyguiles , The line “really smile with your eyes” is very powerful all by itself. This song is quite important. The arrangement is so fitting with the lyrics and the vocal performance is full of emotion. I very much appreciate discovering demos of this caliber. Well done, everyone.

I love the slow pace and simple, beautiful arrangement. It draws me in to really hear the words, and so feel the feelings, framed in your hauntingly human voices.

The harmonies on the chorus almost brought me to tears in this dry cleaners. Thank a lot!! 😭

The melody and chords just enhance this lyric so much. Again, the instrumentation is so beautifully understated.

The line “really smile with your eyes” gets me each time it’s repeated.

This is truly remarkable. Feel like it would miss the point to single out individual elements: everything contributes beautifully to this emotionally luminous song. Well done.

Just incredible. This song reaches right into your heart and twists it. Moments like this make it clear that music can communicate a lived experience to others who have never lived it themselves, more powerfully than... perhaps anything else in this world.

This is a very emotional song. I can see why you had to sit with it and process for awhile. The lyrics, music, and performance perfectly captured the intimate nature of this experience. The music is lush and somber, but in a beautiful and very human way. I just love that about music. Great work and one to be proud of.

@cathreu Wow. Reading your feedback, as the one who lives this highly autobiographical song every day, really touched me. I put a lot if vulnerability into the lyrics, and appreciate they moved you.

This is gut wrenching. I had to listen three times to try and process the emotions present and it stell feels like there's more to understand. This concept of life creeping on and becoming too heavy, the trudge through loss, the pain still carried and coloring every day. This is a beautiful piece of music and those harmonies are giving me shivers.

Wow! This really hit me in the feels. Great production and composition too!

I'm not crying. I'm cutting onions... This is a powerful song. The lyrics hint at struggles without going into details that draw attention away from the raw emotion. And the music really brings the emotions home. When the cello comes in... Wow.

Wow, y'all really came together to transport me into this situation. The tempo/cadence is perfect. The tremble in the vocal line on Together we must try gave me chills supported by the evocative cello and piano lines.

The lyrics speak of such a tough subject wrapped in another tough subject. I can feel that fear of the unknown in your music and vocals. I love this line: "Really smile with your eyes". I can imagine this as a theatrical piece. Maybe the ending can be happy in at least one respect :)

I absolutely love the piano accompaniment. You feel the tone of the song right out of the gate with the first harmonic progression. The vocal harmonies add so much depth, and the cello adds a beautiful warmth to the texture. Really excellent rise and fall in intensity towards the end of the song. Great ending.

this is really beautiful and bittersweet. and heavy. the song finished playing about a minute ago and i'm still trying to figure out what to say in a comment, other than "FAWM eon" of a the week and a half was well spent. the melody and instrumentation really brings the lyrics to life.

This is so beautiful— at once intimate and theatrical. The lyrics are gut wrenching and that cello just aches. Really well done

@monty @williamjames

Wow, thank you so much! The lyrics are so vulnerable indeed. I wrote this song for me and my husband. @wynia was so brave to tackle writing the piece after she sat with it for a while, I don’t blame her for needed to soak it in for a while! It’s super heavy.

I played this for my husband when it went live on FAWM last night and we just sat in stunned silence afterwards.

This is next level. You guys create awesome music. Brings a tear to the eye. So somber and melancholic. Heartwrenching lyrics. Absolutely a masterpiece.

OMG this beautiful. And incredibly evocative. The voices are wonderful and the cello is the perfect touch. It's one of the best songs I've heard all FAWM. The production and arrangement is perfect. And the lyric... wow.

While minor keys are not that frequent in popular music, I really like them. This song shows off mood and musicality. Really enjoyed the addition of the cello. Prior to retiring, I spent seven years in the administration of a symphony orchestra and always enjoyed it when the cello got into the spotlight in an arrangement.