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Ancestry
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There is a quote from George Eliot towards the end of the song:
"...even justice makes its victims..."
which is part of a longer quote from The Mill on the Floss.
Favorite Person
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You help me, you try to help me
Even though I’m hard to help
I don’t want it, I don’t need it,
But when you give it to me
You return me to myself
You’re my favorite person in the whole wide world
You do the same thing every day
you blame it on me, find a way
I think you’re changing every day
I'm changing the same way
I don't have to meet you halfway
Music
I’m working out my issues on you
I see you working out for me
We’re working it all out somehow
It seems we’re working out miraculously
I still haven’t met anyone I’d rather live / fight / leave here with
I still haven't met anyone I like more than you
You’re so selfish for me, you impress upon me
What you love about me, I can’t take credit for
You give me the best cut, you plate it pretty
You thank me for something I can’t take credit for
You’re my favorite person in the whole wide world
Walk down the hall to tell me some story about
what happened last night You would never leave me out
You plan it for me, Make it all about me
Go out with your friends, you would never cause me doubt
If I have to lay low with someone,
I want you in my foxhole, you’re the one
If I have to isolate with someone
In a lockdown we can have fun
Apocalyptic
I was working on this song and read this article by Peter Brannen and it just seemed to fit,
so I pulled some words from his first paragraph.
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No more words All the words have been said
By someone else’s tongue And they all fall dead
When the fireball from heaven comes rushing in
And the future is growing dim, the fix is in
The music of the spheres, the clashing of the spears
The screeching of tires, the tearing apart of the years
Continents crash together, rip apart, turn inside out
Sloshing ocean on a skin of rock covers our wobbling orb circling
The thermonuclear explosion on the inside in the void
Icy rocks careening overhead, the tug of celestial bodies
Points Earth toward a new North star
No more songs all the songs have been sung
By someone else’s tongue And they all are done, over and done
The music of the spheres, the clashing of spears
The screeching of tires, the tearing apart of the years
When the fireball from heaven comes rushing in
And the future is growing dim, the fix is in
Continents crash together, rip apart, turn inside out, killing nearly everything
Sloshing ocean on a skin of rock covers our wobbling orb circling
The thermonuclear explosion on the inside in the void
Icy rocks careening overhead, the tug of celestial bodies
Points Earth toward a new North star
Winter of Our Bitterness
I vent the wind to feel the cold again.
Never knew a winter to feel like this.
Why would we ever agree to live like this?
Those first few days promised summers of bliss
But this is the winter of our bitterness.
The seed of frost was in the first kiss
But who could have ever known it would end up like this.
I knew, I knew, I knew like snowflakes flew
Sideways, in my face. I know it’s not just the taste.
It is the bite, it is how much you give
When I press you between these old bones called my teeth.
It is the look when I walk in the room.
Do I light up your eyes or do they fall like icicles
do?
Those first few days promised summers of bliss
But this is the winter of our bitterness.
The seed of frost was in the first kiss
But who could have ever known it would end up like this.
You knew, you knew. I told you all. You knew too.
Sideways, to your face. This is a huge mistake.
I don’t want to know what you think of me
Or if you look at me what do you see
I wish you’d freeze. I would shatter you with a blow.
I’d leave you silent. You’d melt long after I
go.
Those first few days promised summers of bliss
But this is the winter of our bitterness.
The seed of frost was in the first kiss
But who could have ever known it would end up like this.
You knew, I knew. We knew like snowflakes flew
Sideways, in our face. This is a goddamn disgrace.
I have given to you all of these years.
All you are getting from me is more icicle
tears.
Leaving Boston
I was living in a big drafty house
One room on the second floor
The rest of the rooms let by queer folk
One or two behind every door
It was cold that winter, bitterly
Froze the noses off the faces
Of waiters and waitresses
Walking to the T, rushing to catch the T
Started to know this city’s not for me
When even the waitresses were PhDs
I don’t want to compete. I just want to leave
I just want to leave
Between the creeping cold and the drudgery,
The lonely jobs that didn’t fit me
I was looking to leave. I was looking to leave
The misfit jobs that didn’t fit me
Leaving Boston
The sweet South calling me
Just needed someone to follow
Needed someone to lead
Someone with a fire in their belly
Someone to follow
Someone to lead
I was walking out into the street
The middle of Mass Ave in the middle of the week
One stop from Harvard Square
I was ready to go anywhere
In this city of geniuses
Even the waitresses
Are PhDs, I don’t want to compete
I just want to leave
I’m looking for less concrete
I am looking for trees
Too many people if you need the T
I’m looking for space where I can breathe
What I Believed Last November
I throw myself down onto the grass and lie
I throw myself into the arms of a tree and hang on as the wind comes rushing by
I press my heart into the ground and hang on as the world goes spinning around
I don’t believe in anything but I know the dirt is real
The tree in my grasp and the wind I can feel
I turn my face to the sun and hide from the cold
I remember nothing before I was born and I know I’m growing old
I believe birdsong in spring makes the heart leap
The lullaby of a baseball game on the radio on a midsummer’s night lulls you to sleep
Cicadas mean the end of summer
The cry of a bird of prey on a winter’s day only pierces the lonely
I believe in endless cups of tea
And a simple meal’s the best way to warm your belly
Failing that is laughter
Or a drink and a smoke and taste you won’t remember til after
Endless cups of tea
Things that you can feel and taste, things that you can see
If that makes somebody sad it’s just because they want you to have what they have
Cinnamon and woodsmoke
Fresh mint leaves crushed between the teeth
Dinner on the stove, fresh baked bread
Kissing the top of a sleeping baby’s head
Come Down Off the Mountain
I wrote this song while I was driving home from Arkansas.
Give me no more of this mountain
That the old ones call the hills
Give me no more of the shadows
Of the old Ozark hills
Give me no more of these speeches
Or the flags that strangers fly
Or the unfamiliar tongues
Or the strange god that hears their cry
Get me down off the mountain
Get me down from these hills
Get me off this winding highway
I don’t want to be there still
I don’t want the scenic byways
I don’t want the overlook
Do not take the mountain highroad
Though it promises the view
It’s up here winter’s coming early
And the leaves have start to turn
I feel the chill
In the shadows of the old Ozark hills
Come on down off of the mountain
Come on down off of the hills
Come on down through the winding highway
Past the shadow of the hills
Leave the gullies and the valleys
And the rivers down below
Get out of the mountain shadows
Before fall colors go
Drive away from the Delta
Drive away from the pines
Drive away from the red rolling hills
And the old iron mines
I don’t want to hear your stories
Or place your stone among my cares
I don’t want your gifts of kindness
To carry with me everywhere
Give me mess and honest anger
Give me all my troubled sons
Give me one day of honest work
And spice for the tongue
Give me my red cedars
And the pin oaks of my land
And the friendly facing rises
And the dirt where they stand
It’s the gentle sloping shoulders
Of your grandma in repose
It’s the easy rolling highway
Like a shrug of I suppose
Now I’ve gone so long I’ve traveled
Now I know what is home
It’s the place that you return to
When everything’s gone wrong
Where you sink into your loved ones
And say this is what it is
What it should be this is where forever
Now until the end.
Come on down off the mountain
Come on down from the hills
Come on down the winding highway
With its soon creeping chill
Let’s go down off the mountain
Let’s go down out of the hills
Let’s go down the winding highway
Why do you linger there still
Come on home.
Walking in Circles
I’m walking in circles
I can’t find my head
I checked the table, the counter, the workbench
The dresser, the bed
I don’t know why
I can’t keep a thought
I’m like a memoir cut into ribbons and
Strewn like tinsel on something someone else bought
I see a notebook
I look for a pen
Then I remember I’m looking for you
And I begin to look again
I walk in circles
I find myself drifting from room to room
I’m not angry or sad or impatient
I’m too lost to be doom and gloom
You ask me a question
I chase the answer down a hole
It’s not wonderland or wild geese I’m chasing
It’s what you do to my lost soul
You tell me a story
I stop and turn to you
I know there was something I was supposed to be doing
But I feel the unraveling end is coming soon
You make me laugh
You make me stop and smile
If I have to be circling I want to circle around you
If you make me stop I’ll happily stay a while
I’m walking in circles
I find myself drifting from room to room
Maybe I’m circling around you
Or maybe I recall I’m looking for you
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