1. |
Crimson
01:41
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I’m gonna spell it out to you
every feeling that you should’ve known.
I was a candle in your room --
patient burning, yearning in my glow.
But ghastly breath snuffed me out,
I go unseen by you.
But passing thru the mist tomorrow
you will know the fume
Someday I’m gonna spell it out.
Bleach my eyes in a solemn ritual.
Sadness of ruckus from my mouth
like a flame from a scene of crimson hell.
Why sing songs, why suffer on?
Why wake up at all?
When beauty is on the shelf
and just your portrait is on my wall.
Scratch your story in a cave
to be found and loved in a future age
‘cuz no one wants to hear it now.
But don’t yield, no no, don’t shut your mouth.
Why sing songs, why suffer on?
Why wake up at all?
If we can’t stand up here together
prepare to face your fall.
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2. |
Living by the River
04:39
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My clementine and me --
we’re driving out to the Mississippi.
The city life was wrought with trouble --
drunk and riled up, streets and rubble.
Let’s pack the car and leave this town.
I’ll find new work to keep us sound.
When she remembers all this toil,
it won’t matter, it won’t matter
We’ll be living by the river.
Living by the river.
For the river makes for breezy love
in the sugar afternoon.
Sleepyhead why do you wait?
Come and live by the riverbank!
But the water’s creeping up too high
and with the whippoorwill she wails and cries.
I lost my money and I lost her lovin’ --
Now in the morning I’ll be running
You’ll find me living by the river.
Living by the river.
For the river is the only land
for a wandering man to go.
Sleepyhead why do you wait?
Come and live by the riverbank!
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3. |
Bathers
03:46
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Take some time to dry off your mind.
Crest and crash, resist the tide.
Learning to live is like walking on an icy lake --
hearing each crack and falling hard on your face.
You gaze up, you make love in the vacuum
apart from everyone else, floating in yourself --
forging sediments into sentiments
and back again.
Bathing too long, like chalk our skin gives away
to raisin limbs in feeble choreography.
Crawl to sand, take your stand, now the gods swim
and we send them all back to the springs from which they came.
I’m talking perfect human harmony --
like damn, man.
Take some time to dry off your mind.
Crest and crash, resist the tide.
Mermaid and man -- I kissed her hand and then she vanishes.
9 pm vigil out on the wine dark sea.
Across the water there -- twenty lights flickering.
We’re hanging on.
We’re hanging on.
Supper club lit up out on the highway ridge.
Foghorns echo soft from a boat passing the bridge.
We could rest right here.
Why not rest right here?
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4. |
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Stories from flippant mouths did tell
of a hidden house in the northern foothills
where one could spot, hid hind the gate
the ghost of our dear old President Abe.
Matthew and I, we’d always protest
so we set out to put these rumors to rest.
Packing a lunch and a camera eye,
we trekked to the plain where they say Lincoln did lie.
And we roamed thru the reed and stone.
Till we saw it there below an apple tree --
a quaint red shack that whispered to me.
A ripple of trouble, a sliver of fright
scampered down my back in the noon daylight.
We enter the house but no soul to be found --
only Lincoln’s hat on a desk upside down.
Inside an eagle feather and a cedar pipe.
I wanted to scream, to run for my life.
But he appears in our path.
He started to speak but we turned and ran
and we never told a soul about Abraham.
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5. |
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Take me back to what I knew
before I felt so blue,
before I was a chump,
before my heart was dumped out like the trash.
I dread your absence, Jane.
You’re a specter in my brain.
It’s driving me insane.
Oh darling, won’t you have mercy on me.
Jane, Jane, Jane why do you hate me?
Explain real plain why would you hate me?
‘Cuz you break me down so many times --
choking on this bitter wine.
Jane, don’t you laugh.
Don’t laugh at me, no
The universe made a ploy
to rob me of my joy.
They say I’m just another boy,
but Jane, you were the only gal for me.
Now I’m up late in the night
and I’m scheming how to make things right.
‘Cuz I want your love Jane
and I don’t wanna wait, no
Jane, Jane, Jane why do you hate me?
Explain real plain why would you hate me?
‘Cuz you break me down so many times --
choking on this bitter wine.
Jane, don’t you laugh
Don’t laugh at me, no
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6. |
Brothers
03:21
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Brother, called me up
and we rowed out to the bluff --
trying to put ear to ear.
Roaring over new song.
In passage to a home set out from my brother.
My brother.
We belong here, it’s in our blood.
We were dreamed up from the mud --
brother knows all about it.
He says hear me out --
“It’s our duty to love what we got, you can’t love no other.”
Love thy brother.
Brother called me up.
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Mittelstadt Wisconsin
wild dogs in a lunar junkyard, banging on scrap metal and making the songs of the Americas
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