A woman stands two feet from a grave
a tongue of fresh dirt tasting bitter history
“What is mine ends with me.”
One long knife, night lightening in my side
made enough blood to make two more of you
“Its gnarled and its sharp, its a wall to the stars
I’m knocking me against my skin.”
Following these motions is like pissing in the ocean
those I rode will find the shallows a shade deeper in my shadow
“Stupid Fate”
“I’m trying to get out of my skin
like a snake crawling out of his ribs
slipping nickles into fortune cookies
singing, Stupid Fate.”
The Bomb in Him
‘must have been a bomb in him
with red lights blinking and hypnotyzing smoke
“I’ve got the fury, the reason and the why.”
What he had was a ten mile high stupid bone
He had one game in his deck: snatching collars off of runover dogs
Until Karma killed him in a car crash
Now he’s a pile of teeth on the street
his head cut like a cake
his legs like axes in sand
buried dumb before the damage was done
Another talker rolled up in carpet and beaten blind
I mean crab walking crooked
Like I said, must have been a bomb in him
“I got the fury, the reason and the why.”
No Home
I ain’t got no home, I ain’t got no sign
I ain’t got no jokes to tell, I don’t have the time anyhow
I ain’t walking tall, I’m knee deep in crimes
I don’t know what’s wrong, Blind Terror’s got a seeing eye dog
Heap that dirt right over me I’m going home today
I don’t got nothing to leave behind
I never had nothing no way
I ain’t got no home
Rivers
She’s stumbling, scattered three rivers wide
The butchered bitch took back her surprizes
she stuffed them in her hollow eyes
She might look at you craving sight if she looks at you at all
She might stir the wind to blow you down
She’s building her nest from dirt, fly wings and spit
She’s an arrow with no direction flying just to miss
No one hears her circling, shovel the ashes on
A calliope of whistling fear, fear a lifetime long
There was a shipwreck in her soul, all the sailors died
Now she ties her men up with rivers, a hurt three rivers wide
Burning Rope
I put my cigar out in the mirror and watch the reflection burn
When I think of what I wasted carrying that weight hunger watches
A garden of faces slit like a knife sailed the tide
and broke, thinking of nothing
Strangers, all of them, moving to Stranded
to swim in the sandpits think of nothing
Smoke in my hair, what a weight I have wasted
carrying nothing to an unmade bed
And smoking rope, smoking rope thinking of nothing
When you came near me my jaw rusted
decisive like a bullet
I’m burning now, my life is pulled from under you
You are my only witness, the only mark on the water of an accident
Think of, think of something but burning rope
Dog Eats Dog
One dog is put down for eating another
So, you’re picking glass out of your ear
One cloud meets another in the sky
One hat is taken by mistake
The red flag looks orange, its a madhouse
and why the Hell does that matter now?
Its a strange line you’re walking now
Who did you do nothing to?
What’s there to believe?
I didn’t offer any questions, I didn’t say no
Its a strange way you regret it
“All or nothing and I’ll remember you”
Forever lasted a while, it lasted a second
and dog eats dog again, and dog eats girl
One dog…
Trouble
(Opens with an audio sample borrowed from Orson Well’s “the Trial)
“You’re not going to be any trouble now are you?”
I don’t want any trouble I just wanna go my way
But ole demon Mischief seeks me out wherever I am
A sinkhole of suicides, a deep well of problems and poison wine
I built my house on quicksand, I put my hope in lies
I don’t want any trouble, I just want to feel alive
But ole demon Mischief follows like a drug dog sniffing lines
You could say I ask for it by making pains once on a while
I’ve got a tired old face built not to smile
and heavy fists that swing too wide
I don’t want any trouble but we find each other at every port
He slips hurt in my gin and makes me crawl
regretting every day as it comes
I’m gonna shoot up that fool next time he comes around
I don’t care who’s face he’s wearing
I’ve had enough of being Trouble’s son
Drunk-tank
I woke up in the drunk-tank with bat shit in my mouth
The guy in the next cell cried all night like a one word parrot “Lies”
I was still damn tight when they let me go
from all the gin and the fights I had the night before
Lucky for me it was 9:15, the bars were open
I went to piss on the fire some more
She was there, a cyanide flower
Crazy and wound up, no shame in her ways, talkin’ on
My head was an open window and a big mess walked up behind me
Talkin’ on, talkin’ on
My hat was shrinking on my head, dive bomb believable
Talkin’ on, talkin’ on
Sham
I did my part to take up the time
I shook my cane and the jewels on my wings
There’s one less curve in the circle now
The sword’s swallowed and I’m afraid to shit
A hundred foot wave is turning to steam
You can watch all day and never see the real thing
Its just a sham and the ghost of a sham
remember that when the trouble begins
I won’t ask for a minute more
Time is just another mile to drag the chains
A sack of hearts looking for a way a cuss
a steam driven grave-digger making room for all of us
I’d sing myself to sleep
but the cats are better singers than me and loving all the trouble
A hundred foot wave…
I’m sitting on death’s jaws
fishing from a pier of teeth
I’m waiting for a pull on that line
and proof that there’s more to me
I’m watching the waves for a sign
of what’s coming tonight
when the lights go out
and the clock runs dry
Its just a sham and the ghost of a sham
remember that when the trouble begins
Got It Made
I got it made, I’m whistlin’ in bed
the gin train comes a’rollin’ whenever I ring my little bell
A pork chop is fine if that’s all you have
But, as for me, I drink bowls of fat
and wash it down with half-n-half
I got a goose who lays golden eggs
I built a cage right over my bed
so I can watch my money happen again and again and again…
I’m not superstitious but I know I got it made
I don’t know how that goose makes all the gold
but I drink to much to his health everyday.
Singularity 2001-2009
the Lion’s Jaws
What I can see is a nameless ache
a want completed by abuse
Start with everything until the beginning
when you beg for a jailbreak
so things might end differently
You’re following a shadow of yourself
it’s an empty road on a night as black as this
What I can see is a shortsighted whim
a plagiarized wish cast in the well
of a cannon’s barrel
Uncertain of the road and no one to take you home
Keep the moon in both eyes
as hungry as she is she won’t destroy you twice
You’re following a shadow of yourself
it’s an empty road on a night as black as this
Put mud on your teeth, it’s the perfect disguise
for a mouthful of stars
No one should ever know
how close they are to the lion’s jaws
But that’s all I can see
Ascent
Look what you’ve done to me
the gallows birds unfurl their wings
The sky looks dead
Why is it beneath us?
No one knows where we are now
Listen to the world speak
‘sounds like gulls laughing at a shipwreck
A runaway carriage
with four horses stealing for freedom
No one knows where we are now
Lie to Realize
Remind me of this when we are old
When I’ve forgotten all the waves
that have passed over my head
Too many dark nights in a row
I’m lucky that I saw anything at all
I have never thought of the end
You can see I’m not shaken to realize and lie
I will be ready when the time comes
to drink all the answers someday
As the waters close over my head
one thing is clear, I have never been a child
There are more chances to lose
more mistakes to shine
and hide under the bed
I will be ready when the time comes
to drink all the answers someday
Last Words
She began with a surrender
“When I die later on tonight”
A long shot of a bloody hallway
“You knew this would happen”
At the end was a woman who didn’t belong
“I want you to lock me in a shallow grave”
A heap of skin with barely a bone in it
“I don’t want too much time wasted”
I think it’s dead, cover it up
Iconoclasm in the dark day of fame
“Give a word for ritual’s sake”
Trouble is a dead heart on the sidewalk
“Pour out some gin, call it a homecoming”
Right beside it is a corpse pulsing light
“I want you to make out on my grave”
It becomes a question of what you survived
“Dry hump in the dirt shoveled over my head”
I think it’s dead, cover it up
Candy
Beauty’s too easy
A crazy house drawing of a crazy house burning
Am I walking alone like Judas now
Are the coins on my eyelids the price for my power
Don’t cry for nothing
The trick’s a gift from the system of somatic attrition
It’s so sweet it sticks to my pride
Does it matter if it’s real
so long as you can feel it
This monkey’s dancing for his candy
he’d say anything to see more of it
Just wait ’till you wake up and see
there’s so much to an accident
The mind’s not as helpless as it seems
It built the machine that promises nothing
The monkey’s dancing for his candy
Soldier
If he was searching for a reason to run he found one
His helmet came undone and cleared his mind of arguments
Mortar shells and bullets sowed a dangerous field surrounding him
What blooms in a cataclysm but myth and adrenaline
A missile dug his grave ten feet from his face
with a hundred shovels so he’d believe it
What a joke of a distance for all the miles a man will go
to find his sailboat at the port and decide he hates the water
Silence after silence after silence after…
The soldier shuddered his eyes from the situation facing him
as an angel of death lit a cigar with her eyelashes
She told him to find a hole and stay there
Every door to leave was closed
Silence after silence after silence after…
Mutant
I can see that you are changing and mistaking the pains
for a murder weapon lesson in remaining the same
Look out behind you, watch your blood
The river will run backwards if you have any luck
If I could hold you up to the light
I’d see a mess of bones that don’t fit together right
If you imagined this would last forever
you’re in for a dismal thrill
It turns out you should be feeding the pigs
but we all have better uses than the ones we assume
If I could hold you up to the light
I’d see a mess of bones that don’t fit together right
Go back to bed, life has been dream
It didn’t shake you awake, that was me
Paradise
You got a steep fucking problem, babe
dead at the bottom of a well
There’s blood on the walls and mud under your nails
The bells didn’t ring for you
no, they never did
What was it that you thought you saw?
A callous star in the shadow of sedition
Welcome back to paradise
Fifteen minutes ’till illumination
and there’s nothing to fear
You are the only movie star in the world
and no one’s left alive to see your style
A dog is riding the darkhorse
He’s looking for wives
All money is yours and all the dead girls too
Welcome back to paradise
The good luck dried up when you slipped on the ice
and a bottle broke your fall
Praying won’t save you, it just makes the dog growl louder
The prisons have wings, they fly to see you fall
All the money is yours and all the dead girls too
Welcome back to paradise
Obituary
Rolled up in style
your dress over your head
Left in between nowheres
Remembered for the first time
far from the strangers trying to place you
The separation only lasted a lifetime
He has known you before
on a Spanish road to exile
and in the jungle of Singapore
The war in 1916
turned you into a friction machine
A shell-shocked woman praying for paradise
Now she is looking down
She thinks she sees the way it is
Dead and dreaming, scheming up fictions
wishing against Hell for Paradise
You are the only witness to this
Tomorrow
Come closer, I’ll tell you a secret
This time I really mean it
Through a curtain of pearls, with knives on my tongue
This is going to be fun
Tomorrow’s never starting
She wonders if anything’s possible
Every minute she lives living means less to her
One thing is certain, beyond the darkness of sorrow
There’s no tomorrow
Tomorrow’s never starting
She stands at the lips of a kill
A maze of intentions, perfectly still
In a tower of silence promises crash like planes
The secret never whispered is the song of release
of painless gain
Quo Vadis
When you get sick of winning, of screaming in the wind
and the shock outlasts the grace of the moment you could take
The world’s still for you although you know that it is moving
and the air gets hotter with every lonely breath
Obvious objections, like cyanide injections
close down the fortress for you before decisions break
Call out to anyone now, the storm is at its worst
A plague of attentions for every subtle face
I know a way out of here
its underground where the ceilings are low
You could go down river where the currents are carnivores
Or you could take that pill that takes you out
before you wonder where its is that you’re going
The mesmerizing fallout of a terrorized fake
never really certain of ever being certain
Suicide may suit you, it’s a matter of taste
When your tongue is on the floor horses charge towards you
Build your coffin here on the shores of an ending
quickly cast away the shadow and its rope
Time won’t find you if its dead, drowning in chains
In the glassy depths of then, of yesterday and never
I know a way out of here
its underground where the ceilings are low
You could go downriver where the currents are carnivores
Or you could take that pill that takes you out
before you wonder where it is that you’re going
Bodybag
I fought for too long to take back the bullets I placed in other men
But I won’t deny myself the rule of chance that one has missed
I’m someone now that I am not
I’ll zip my own bodybag
It wrecked my faith when someone put a lily in my rifle’s end
A shortchanged rage that falls flat in the squalor I’ve always known
Just give me an excuse to use this thing
I’ll zip my own bodybag
Whore
There’s a whore in my cellar and she won’t leave
I keep her drunk on sheep’s blood and schnapps
She said the men in the trenches “got big eyes” on her
Always with a fixed gaze right down her throat
How did she get here?
Now she’s waiting for missiles
Time, wasting time, when I should be walking away
If you must stay I won’t stay here to die with you
She tied herself to the ceiling, she said she’s never leaving
and she wants me to feed her
I’m of the disposition this problem just needs a pill
and the slut will come crashing straight through to Hell
How did she get here?
Now she’s waiting for missiles
Time, wasting time, when I should be walking away
If you must stay I won’t stay here to die with you
Dirty men in a dirty war, a lucky fuck in the mud
It takes a certain kind of woman to sell her ass on the front
A radiation cloud is the only future she can think of
Now she’s waiting for missiles
Waves
Won’t you speak a little more softly dear
though it seems far, I am right here
Although I have danced with you alone
I’ve never felt nearer than now
You can be beside me
all you have to do is open your eyes
I have sent a wish to your ear
in a star’s gleaming light
The years will vanish who can say where they go
It’s all wind casting waves at the shore
If memory is a sea I’m sailing those depths
with a promise never to leave nor forget
You can be beside me
all you have to do is open your eyes
I have sent a wish to your ear
in a star’s gleaming light
Friction
You’re more trouble than you’re worth
a little cuss with a steel idea
rotten to the smile behind a set of saline ditches
Desire in mind, a bankrupt condition
of falling to your knees
It’s no secret why you’re here
Destiny’s indiscretions revealed
The lifetimes you wasted scheming up fictions
came back to tell you the answer is friction
Freedom’s no puzzle when you’re homeless and drunk
and hungry for fucking anything that will give
Mysteries fade when a dose of real sympathy
is buried alive beneath a mountain of causes
Roses won’t wilt when they’re woven from glass
but the fragments have an innate gift for slicing
So, little blackbird, lick the blood from the snow
its the only wound you’ll find around for miles
The lifetimes you wasted scheming up fictions
came back to tell you the answer is friction
Thrills
I don’t mind that you’re watching
at least that means that I’m still here
Though my clothes are burned to rags
and my dreams are ashes at my feet
Who the hell wants to disappear?
when the light go down you were no one, never here
This is life and these are the thrills
an open casket raking the waves
In a swift escape its difficult to forget
a new myth for the disillusioned
Who the hell wants to disappear?
When the light go down you were no one, never here
Beautiful Animals are Meant to be Eaten
What a fine price to pay to the eye that won’t forget
until the world stops spinning
Chase him through the forest and touch him as you eat him
Touch him as you need it
Beautiful animals are meant to be eaten
Agree with everything, pleonize with pride
and lose your place in line
What you don’t know is everyone can hear you thinking
Touch him when you need him
Beautiful animals are meant to be eaten
Something beautiful belongs to you but you might not ever see it
Will you settle for believing?
Bang you chains on forever’s rim
where no one can forget
Where beautiful animals are meant to be eaten
Reasons
I’ve never opened my eyes ’till now
I’ve never seen the light
I’ve never seen my own hands
I’ve never wanted to
Hell’s factory sent a wheel rolling down hill
I’ve never seen the world spin
I’ve never wanted to
Reasons, no reasons, no call for the crash
Wet knuckles and a hole in my head from nothing
For nothing
If every sunken ship rises from the depths
it still won’t be today
I’m hanging on a hope, on a wish that won’t come true
with a hole in my head from nothing
For nothing
Hurry Back
I turned you away because you lost your way to me
and you spoke without your tongue
Put the weapon down, there’s been too much blood
and you know you’ll regret this too
Hurry back to us, no one is tamed before their turn
Don’t act dumb, it’s not safe
I turned you away because you lost your way to me
Hurry back, hurry back, back to us
A Letter from Hell
I got a letter from Hell, told me to watch my back
Somebody’s chasing me, wants to break my neck
Turns out his wife thinks I’m hot
and he can’t get it up
He hasn’t seen her for weeks and thinks she’s shacked up with me
I got another one too, right after that
It says, “You’re doing great work. Can’t wait to see what’s next!”
I got several more come, with the edges burned
Turns out I’m bigger than God where no one wants to go
I’ve got to make up my mind what kind of shark I want to be
Got a marriage proposal from a widow of three
she says she just can’t wait to be the widow of me
Saw a line or two from an ex-president
he said the job wasn’t worth the pay
in Hell he loses an election every day
I got several more come with the edges burned
Turns out I’m bigger than God where no one wants to go
I’ve got to make up my mind what kind of shark I want to be
I’ve made up my mind, there are no doubts now
Sharkskin Suit
End up in the shark-tank, satisfied without a smile
Rose colored water in your eyes, all around you secrets float
Swim to the side and kiss yourself against the glass
Because this moment’s so fucking right lightning strikes the water
It is normal to become the hunter
You run all of your life until you stop
to turn around and show your teeth to the creatures pressing in
A piece of you is priceless now, you’re satisfied
The waves collapse over your head, you cum
an act of faith is a loaded gun
You can’t change but you can end it
Wonderful
It’s not an easy thing to say my days are done
to walk into that mouth and lay between those teeth
I never dreamed this is how I’d make my way
but Death demands me now, so now I return
This is a wonderful day to be me
Keep my memory with the other myths
although I won’t be here to hear a word of it
I’ve lived my day and seen enough to know
that when my evening comes its time to lock the doors
This is a wonderful day to be me
When those lips close, that will be my dusk
and if you watch me your face will be my Sun
This is a wonderful day to be me
Nothing Left but the Future
All the girls, they got shiny new guns
on the way to yesterday when the worst of us had it made
They crossed their hearts with lightning bolts
swore to steal a spot on the sun
and shoot holes in the sky so we could see nothing farther on
Stars were burned on their faces too bizarre to be held
Our eyes were raised to the chance of robbing the past
as though something were left for the future
when there’s nothing left but the future
Nothing Left to Burn
You said the sweetest things before you killed me
That death would make us one to wander sunsets
where devils beg
You said the sweetest things before you dressed me in knives
That the night falls to hide us
from jealous angel’s eyes
Don’t tell me there’s nothing left to burn
As life began to leave me you told the sweetest lies
That a glowing palace awaited us
above the clouds in paradise
When my final breath departed and to you the knife should turn
You set my wounds on fire and said, “There’s nothing left to burn.”
I watched you believe you were free
But what you failed to destroy was the jewel you left in me
There is something left to burn
Knife to my Chin
I kissed my lips in the truest reflection that I’ve ever seen
’twas in the knife held to my chin by the crook I adore
before she sold my own heart back to me
I love you, adore you, tear me to pieces
I want you, abhor you but save part of me for…
Only the possessed fuck like this
slow down before you cut into me
Behind those brilliant black eyes a cruel child plays
ferocious, and cunningly
I love you, adore you, tear me to pieces
I want you, abhor you but save part of me for a sweet ending
Golden Baby
This is not the walk of shame, she’s very proud of what she’s done
A funeral for her dignity, undoing personality
All you’ve done will go to waste, all you do will ruin you
Shitting on her God has been her greatest act, He knows it too
She’s another lost girl in the dream machine of delusion manufacturing
Desire destroyed her, broke every lovely bone she showed
“I am golden, baby, everything goes my way
I was born from a cake, icing flows through my blessed veins”
the Secret Little Mess
I cut Daddy up with love, I only hated parts of him
Momma said to yesterday when they chopped her head away
Just before they laid her out Momma held me to her breast
there to calm my crying down with a last loving caress
“I gave your Daddy poison because parts of him were bad
but he lived to tell the jailor, now my head is in his hands.
It’s your job today to hatchet Daddy like I should have.
Hush darling, make Momma proud.
Honey you’re so good, so good.”
Daddy’s hands were nice to me, they pet my head when I was tired
but his nose was awfully ugly so I pitched it in a fire
The ring on Daddy’s finger showed a boat floating on the sea
so I went to find a sailor who could take care of me
I found one at the market who seemed nice with kindly eyes
so I showed him Daddy’s finger, he called the jailor and I cried
The jailor took me to a chaplain who said demons live in me
and I should live in Hell with Momma until Hell would cease to be
The magistrate said later that my head was worth my soul
and I should die today to start my terrifying fall
On my way to Hatchet Hill a pretty boy gave me a rose
now my heart is safe with his and will never beat alone
When Momma was here yesterday I snatched her head out of the basket
and hid it underneath my dress, no one knows that I have it
I ponder what the chaplain said and joy is in every breath
Soon I’ll be again with Momma and return her head
Peace be to the pretty boy who holds my heart tonight
Peace be to the axeman and his single strike
Peace be to the chaplain who said I am the Devil’s child
Peace be to the magistrate who sent me here to die
Peace be to the sailor who made me cry
Peace be to the jailor who tied me tight
Peace be to Daddy, even the parts I burned
Peace be to Momma whose head I will return
I cut Daddy up with love I only hated parts of him
Momma said to yesterday when they chopped her head away
I snatched her head out of the basket and hid it underneath my dress
No one knows that I have it, its my secret little mess
Tests 2004
Century
I wanted to drink all night and hope that it would forget me
There was enough time to lock the doors before I was noticed
I couldn’t hold the fire in both hands
My heart went black, shot in the eyes
The sky rolls into night
I never know who you are who who I am
There’s only my teeth in this box but I left room for yours
I may be an old man totally alone surrounded by dogs and steel pins in my knees
I never know who you are
a century of daydreams between us
Seems like we never think enough
or maybe too much to let us happen
After the fact its much easier
to say you always saw it that way
Serious
Let’s make believe that we matter
let’s make believe we are the center of the center
The clothes slide off our backs, we are sheltered from the fire
by the killing winds of superstition
The World staggers like a drunk bitch
homeless and searching for a ride toward the light
My pain is yours as we crumble for each other
Carry my sound close to destruction
Carry me tonight, my scent, my sound
and don’t forget me when I surrender
We could be the bombs falling now
No one can stop our heartbeats because we pretend the rivers flow for us
Let’s make believe we matter, that wish is a serious sound
carried far tonight toward the buildings burning in our hands
We could be the bombs falling now
A Wedding in Egypt
(Although lyrically identical, the music is completely reworked from the Coprolingus version)
Calloway
I got a story to tell you about a reckless fool
who didn’t know what he was doing ’till it was too late to
He handled snakes for a living in a chapel by the river
Pastors praised his faith ’cause he prayed poison away
There was a salesman come with vipers from Arabia
He sold them to churches at the ends of Alabama
He came from town down river on horseback
to find the chapel at the bend where snakes were stroked like gold
He kept a basket on the saddle and a rifle by his foot
He kicked bullets faster than his finger could shoot
His hat brim was short because he didn’t like the shade
A snake can hide in the shadow of a single strand of hair
He knocked on the door of the chapel at noon
Calloway was standing like a statue on the steps
“Do you know where you’ve come, this is a house of the Lord
and you look like the Darkness had His way with your soul.”
“The road’s a dirty place,” the salesman said, “nothing is for sure
I’m tired from the wilds so I’ll just show you why I’ve come
I hear you hold snakes when the Spirit tells you to.
Well, the Spirit told me to come here and sell my snakes to you.
They’re vipers from Arabia, mean and guaranteed to bite
the poison running through their veins is potent, clear as light
If the Lord means for you to dance with serpents in hand
then its time to learn if you are truly our Messiah’s man.”
Calloway said, “Show me. open up your case
I’ll take whatever’s in there and show you a man of grace.”
The salesman looked at him through a gruesome grin
and told him to stand back for the snakes would jump at him
Calloway returned with a high and mighty smile
“Never a’one got me yet that I couldn’t take their sin”
He reached for the basket, put his hand inside
no sooner had he done this than he felt the venom’s sigh
One hungry fucker stuck him, he fell down in a sweat
He said, “I don’t believe in dying, this hasn’t happened yet”
The salesman turned and tipped his hat, “My condolence sir
but these snakes come from desert lands far from everyone
A good Christian snake, I’m sure, you could dance around the world
but these snakes never heard of Jesus, no, they never heard the Word
Stitches
The girl is following her own advice and swallowing
the men recognizing her, her mouth is full of glass so she has
stitches on her knees beyond the bleeding need
Screwing me to pieces and feeling for a final time
Its sexy in the eyes of winners and killers
to fuck themselves in broken mirrors
like lions fighting for the sky
Her past is surviving her beyond the bleeding need
to feel fine for a final time
She says danger makes her stronger but she’s crazier than normal
No one sings behind a silent hymn, a sin depends on sighing men
While everyone is watching won’t you break the box and shock me
by becoming what you might beyond the bleeding need
to feel fine for a final time
Her past is surviving her
Forever
Forever isn’t long enough, I sold it to forget the loneliness
It’s over now, look what I surrendered to
Storms arrived and sang me to sleep, mountain shook rocking me
days divide to give me time
I found my moment in the fold, where God forgot me I can do no wrong
glory’s mine, I sold it high
Forever isn’t long enough, something special surrounds you now
Don’t try, sometimes don’t try
End to This
A smile is a specious sail that’s tempts you nowhere, sinking surely
Its color costs you something crucial
These hands were made for stabbing, fashioned from an iron wish
to save a soul from tempests dawning
and end an end to this
Each road demands its end and more sugared voices follow
the farther down you care to go
You drink the sea to calm its cold, stir the want to steal his clothes
Hold your mind toward the knife where horses beat the ground to freedom
and end an end to the end in sight
Fool’s Parade
Our last night was taken by the chance to live unspoken whims
With heavy hands I softly touched the face that burned life into mine
Cum, then run, the moments hold pain in every pleasure’s robes
The distance rose like hungry smoke, a hidden mouth inside of hope
The moon is full so fools parade a final time before we wake
The moon is full so fools parade because we’re locked away for days
Damaged wonders weighing on us, danger speaks when kindness wants to
God save me from saying too much, a final night, afraid to touch
Remember why and know its only time against the sorrow growing
When the day burns out the night we’ll wake up in a bed of ashes
A final hour to smell your body before we change into a story
The moon is full so fools parade a final night before we wake
Wonderful
(Original music recording. Guitar/drum/vocal one man band style)
One Bright Moment
All of my wishes are coming true
I don’t have to wait for grace to shine on me
I’m already here
All of my dreams are shining bright
I don’t have to wait for the right words to come
everything’s already been said
So, send me home
I’m happy to go
All of my fears are flying by
I don’t have the time to waste on loving hate
jewels are in my eyes
All of my life has led to this
one bright moment before the end
So, send me home
I’m happy to go
All of my wishes are coming true
All of my dreams, all of my fears, all of my life has led to this
One bright moment before the end
Chasing Down Windmills That Turn out to be Giants 2005
Funeral
Its time we talked about who showed up to your funeral
all the ripped aparts and dirty jokes you let drive your race-car for you
There’s a ruthless rule that says
dreams come true you didn’t want to
It’s over, finally it’s over, walk away behind your angel
Could you walk into an empty room
without breaking all the mirrors ’cause they remind you of you
I wonder if you’d take the chance to change
evidence is crucial to the criminal
It’s over, finally it’s over, walk away behind your angel
Here’s a flower for the first time that I saw you
I place it at your feet for Heaven’s meadow
Steal some jewelry for the next time that you see me
maybe God’s gold tooth or a set of ivory wings
It’s over, finally it’s over, walk away behind your angel
The Dance I Dance
(reworked “Stumbling Man”)
Arrive
It feels so good to finally arrive
No machine is perfect because
all intentions fail us always
To speak without the motors clicking behind your skin
is to betray the pretty face the Devil graced you with
It’s a bitter sweat in promised light
reasons change the fact before we try
It’s a wasteland of reaching arms
and shells of joy licked clean and left to dry
It feels so good to finally arrive
Sky
I promised you the sky but I brought it falling down
Half of me lies shattered with it now
Embrace me in this storm, the raging night is yours
Show us how peace feels once more
Roses came too late, the stars wilted on their stems
There are no promises to keep where none are made
We’re wrapped in sheets of ice, surrounded by our shards
Walk slowly away if you leave at all
Made for This
Don’t let your innocence slip away
Every night is another chance
to believe we were made for this
I’m lying in a meadow of your skin
listening to you say, “Its all right, its all right.”
I’ll carve my dreams on memories
in a place that belongs to me
Little is sacred but there they’ll be safe for when
innocence leaves and we try to replace her
Don’t let forgiveness lose its way
There was a time my dear
when stolen moments were all we feared
I’d steal the moon and sell my eyes
to hear you say just one more time, “Its all right, its all right.”
I’ll carve my dreams on memories
in a place that belongs to me
Little is sacred but there they’ll be safe for when
innocence leaves and we try to replace her
Chasing Down Windmills that Turn Out to be Giants
You’re a dangerous distance from your innocence
Crying like a casualty with dry, white eyes
that won’t see solace
Pray for a smile to follow the silence
We were chasing down windmills that turned out to be giants
You know we don’t build prisons anymore
Everyone is guilty of loving something
Don’t be mistaken, your place isn’t beside me
A snake rests upon my face
The show is late, he won’t stop laughing
He won’t stop wishing
Pray for a smile to follow the silence
We were chasing down windmills that turned out to be giants
An Untitled Wish
(reworked from 1990’s version)
No One Died Tonight
No one died today if you believe the news tonight
Folded arms deny it, change the world to save it and watch her run
Throw money at the wall, see if you get what you want
A black eye to prove you were in the war when the others just came back drunk
“No one died tonight.”
You fought for the right to fear and won where there wasn’t a fight
The future is buried below today but beyond your little life
If you could take the world down in flames to die
would there be a reason to trust you again when you said no one died tonight
“No one died tonight.”
the Sleeper Awakes
A bottle breaks on the street
for every windowpane spied through to see
the crowd around a suicide
as nameless as the dog who found him
Pigeons argue on the fire escape
the garbage trucks lift their treasures on to their backs
The church bells moan like a people disposessed
This is sound, the noise of life
Our little room is as loud as outside
I’ve stolen all the time I need
in a dreamless sleep, serene
A man can’t move if a man can’t rest
The time has come for you to taste the second test
To sleep, go to sleep
The Black Market Butcher 2006 (the majority of this CD was musical narrative, these are the few lyrics)
Swindle
This swindle of a city is run by wild animals
The cage doors were lifted off their hinges, they are empty now
The brutal and the beautiful live circus in a rifle barrel
Candle-lit insects follow the dangerous scents of lethal flowers
This is how a child becomes a jackal of the jungle
by not wanting what he knew nor knowing what he wanted
Deserts gleam like the cleaver of the Black Market Butcher
Who’s so eager to meet you, son, and unwind your skeleton
Obsession is the pretty thing a child in mind will chase down wild
serving if it serves to service, the lesser choice is sleeping hungry
A gown made on the Nile
A gentleman with a hero’s smile
Women, women, lithe and swarming
A fire at night when beasts are howling
A stronger drink than what is gone
A softer sleep when war is won
Money, money! flowing golden
and knives for her who lusts for knowing
the Shopboy’s Fantasy
This is a perfect night to daydream
The sky will catch anything I pretend to see
Its darkness is her raven hair, and these stars,
silver dust I laid her on to sleep
Not now, princess, while I’m watching
Find another way to break the spell
besides this, fucked on horseflesh
your hips in a butcher’s bloody fists
You sharpened your knife on me
now another flesh receives the cut
You won’t shake me easy
until you’re too wicked to kill
The Legend of Suzie Sidesaddle 2006 (The text of this CD was performed entirely by a text-to-speech program. The character of Suzie Sidesaddle was a sex doll with a ghost possessed voicebox. It was produced for Fringe Encore New Orleans, 2009.)
Naughty
I am a very, very naughty girl. There is no telling what I might do. I might just eat you up, tiger, and even swallow the bones with a contented smack of my lips. Yummy, you taste like a cake made for me by the queen of fucking Borneo. Just when you splinter into radical desires, unstoppable in every salacious direction, I will stop screwing you and shit on your pant-leg to bring you back to yourself. This is bloodlust as I see it, in a cracked iron lung. Soon no one will breathe the polluted fragrance of my throat.
I am a very naughty girl and a gift to you from above where the hotel burned down and all the spirits are homeless, looking for the crust of bread you represent. Dig into your flesh, treat it like a trench – a place for survival. The rest of the world envies you your irrepressible vitality. Come to me you goddamn stud. Oooh yeah, tiger. Don’t stop you lust magician.
Now you are a repository of senses. In recklessly measured distances you leap ahead of me to reach beyond me, but my body always comes before yours, it is where desire resides. So, where I am you aspire to be, luckless motherfucker. Oooh, I told you I would do it. Now shit voluptuously slithers behind the arch of your knee and downward to your knowing shoes who have walked this asinine adventure before. Your pants, a dirty Bedouin tent, shelters our corpses from the corruptive atmosphere we created in this bed, in this lifetime. Oooh, yeah, wasn’t that the way you wanted it, tiger?
Have a Wonderful Demise
There is a new war between those who favor the sheep and those who say they do but take the wolf’s side secretly. Regardless of which faction you enjoy watching die the most, both live within walls possessing the memory of being looked at fondly, if just once and only by accident. Perhaps an elated net of sight expectantly trawled the spaces between those walls for a face made of other, more important memories; or someone’s eyes slipped from a hung photograph taken during a marvelous afternoon at the slaughterhouse and, fixed in happiness, their glance wandered on to the surface behind it. A horse trainer will sometimes touch the animal on the rope he drags behind him, so, those walls, whomever they contain, occasionally regard the way they are looked at. Walls have the excruciating task of witnessing endless stupidity and, more often than not, ignore the butter smeared buttocks pressed against their well arranged prints. You are another indignity toward the immutable, like an evaporating diamond or a disgruntled side of beef. The new war will end badly for you. Enjoy your cold sweats and have a wonderful demise.
The Parable of the Lion Tamer
Once, in the very chair you are sitting in now, a lion tamer lost his glass eye. He bit a slice of lemon and grimaced, forcing the eye out of its socket and sent it rolling across the floor. After an exhaustive search he surrendered and ran to the big top tent where fanfare was already being played to announce the show. That evening he was forced to perform with an eye patch and nearly crumbled with embarrassment. The audience, unaware that he ever possessed more than that single eye, found his condition so shocking that the thin blooded fainted in the aisles. A one eyed lion tamer was a wonder! He came to know great success, far greater than with his glass eye (which he’d believed it to be an indelicacy to be seen without). He had an imitator: his lion. This lion, envious of his masters fame, convinced another grandly toothed feline to chew out one of his eyes. Quite a different outcome ensued than what he expected. The audience interpreted a maimed lion as a reflection of a degenerate circus which could not afford bloodthirsty animals in their murderous prime. The eyeless lion was ineffective and summarily dispatched. It was in that chair, the one you are sitting in now desiring me, that two destinies formed; that of the crippled lion tamer who was propelled into a glorious career by abandoning artifice; and the grim destiny of the lion, the complete beast dominated by the lacking one who assumed that in reproducing his master’s deficiency he would reproduce his success and, perhaps, dominate at last. Baby, I am your glass eye, discard me and thrive. Other, more attractive and powerful men will envy you to the point of suicide.
Don’t Give Me the Chance to Forgive You
In another lifetime we despised each other. One day your heart turned into blood pudding and you chased me through the city. You waved your arms in the smoke and apologized; you swore you were doing this for my dignity. I wondered what business my dignity was of yours.
From the instant I met you we were nothing but cruel to each other – it seemed natural to hate you and receive your hate. What had you done that wasn’t what you should have? What did you have to apologize for? I realized you were no longer who I thought you were and panicked. In fact, I realized I did not know you at all. You became an insane stranger pursuing me. I hid behind the granite column at the entrance to an office building, a stairwell was at my heels that led down to enormous glass doors. You, stranger, discovered me. With inappropriate passiveness you pleaded that I listen to you, then bit a mouthful of granite from the column and, knowingly pressing your teeth into the stone, carved a miniature sparrow which you offered to me on the tip of your tongue. I wanted to slap you but instead took the sparrow into my own mouth, chewed it up and spit the gravel at your feet. This is how I remember you, as a familiar enemy who became a contrite stranger. I tilted backward and fell down the stairs through the glass doors which sliced me to pieces.
Don’t be a stranger to me tonight, tiger. Instead of biting the cold, granite column of contrition between us, take a mouthful of me and masticate my flesh into the shape you want it to be. Don’t give me the chance to forgive you.
Create an Animal by Becoming One
Bring the scissors over here. Walk toward me across this field of broken glass. Walk carefully, take precautions so as not to puncture that priceless flesh of yours. Never loosen your grip on the solution for a moment. Cut animal shapes out of my skin, wild ones intended for predation and fornication in the silent wilderness. I want you to suspend me in the invisible balloon of chemical sex, in the odor of dirt and secretions that will have to dry where they spill unless you lick them off of me. I will deliver a sound from the source of my throat and encourage it outward into the untamed air. Fashion shapes out of me, silhouettes of creatures with no history; who never envy only steal, who never inquire only investigate, who belong to the blood which inflates them and to the urges that inspire more blood to become. Do you come to me on feet or the cloven hooves of a man to tear apart my malfunctioning body? Make a beast of me, many beasts and know for yourself what it means to create an animal by becoming one.
Anything is Real 2007
24 Faces a Second
Your sadness isn’t sexy anymore
you’re not who you were
I know I said I wanted a dirty girl
but I never mentioned a whore
Be careful with your past
it may be all that you have left
The faces you remember remain in the frame
I won’t hold your dead hand until its warm again
Act, but don’t explain
that won’t elevate you to a meaningful waste
or an execution given in a justice driven prison
with Jesus Christ himself as the witness
Be careful with your past
it may be all that you have left
The faces you remember remain in the frame
I won’t hold your dead hand until its warm again
I see you forgiven in 24 faces a second
Waste
What a waste of a good heart
Cut it out and swallow it fast
She’s only going to feel with it
and that’s not enough to make her real
What a waste
We all have the will to conflict
and the urge to murder
She’s both sides of the game
What will make and what is made
Every animal knows its own time
Every shark has its dark day on the ocean floor
Every man has his nemesis to find
Hope is the predator
What a waste
Miles Ahead
Every time I think of ways I could stay right here
I’m counting them in tears
Don’t tell me which road to choose
Every mile ahead of me is another one away from you
and I’m counting them in tears
One more precious measure of time
surrendered to the end
And I’m waiting for the trials to come
that weigh my heart against
the change I had no courage for
There was a hope hanging on high
the farthest noose from the dirt
every time it swung we held our eyes
and counted them in tears
the Lion’s Jaws (version with voice and guitar alone)
Stranger in a Bubble
You knew I was here, here to see you
You thought only God knew where you were
I’m ashamed to say your murderer’s smile
is no stranger to me than my own
Dark thoughts followed me here
I could no more stop them than they could wait behind
Like animals they charge with unthinking thrusts
The gunshot stars are the only lights among us
I’ve come to stop you, this is why I have to leave
Have you had enough yet?
Have you ever felt so alone?
The treasure you stole you’ll never see
The fortune you burned is still burning
Dark thoughts followed me here
I could no more stop them than they could wait behind
Like animals they charge with unthinking thrusts
The gunshot stars are the only lights among us
I’ve come to stop you, this is why I have to leave
Anything is Real
Do want to hear about your life as it already is?
Do you only want what you already have in your hands?
Wonder for a moment, what if you weren’t made of you
Anything is real, even the island of lost ideas
where you shipwrecked your dreams, they wait for you there
to remember them again
Do you only want to agree with the times?
to surrender your spark to the flickering fire?
Try very hard to get caught in the sky
while the fire below burns itself out
Wonder for a moment, what if you weren’t made of you
Anything is real, even the island of lost ideas
where you shipwrecked your dreams, they wait for you there
to remember them again
Poolshark 2008
Pants
I’m sitting on the bottom of a river
waiting for my pants to dry
I’m clean from my bones to my brain
and sitting on lignam, it a big one
because its mine
Sparks are flying but don’t be afraid, I won’t bite
Pleased again, on the mount of a rocky shoal
Squishy fishes frolic for the promise of a night
for their very own
A day without teeth, no people no beasts
Don’t be afraid they can’t bite
Beg me but I won’t leave
until my pants are dry
Dirge for Secret Agent VI
Everything is fine as you left it
Don’t worry about us
You have so far to travel
Don’t look back for the tears
we will shed for you
The soil we laid you in will keep them
Beyond the sky, beyond the known
is now where you belong
Thank you for who you were
Thank you for the parade you left us with
Everything is fine, dear
The Perfect Life
My little dream do you see the sky
its the ceiling of the mansion I built this night
Everything with is at it should be
Never imagine sadness is a lie betraying me
My soul my star, my rare precious bird
Be cautious not to rest in limbs among hateful words
When the air is beat by bitter wings, leaves will likely fall
And expose you to guns aimed at the possible
Living doesn’t have to be perfect to work
Remember that when the world is yours
Lightening of the nearest cloud, my most important thing
The tear I shed with happiness when bliss belongs to me
I’m giving you the world, this world I hardly know
Maybe you can name it or change the colors of the sun
Living doesn’t have to be perfect to work
Remember this when the world is yours
Bells
Why not change your mind?
You might like what I have to try
Take a little piece of this
chew ’till it does it to you
See, wasn’t that delicious?
I made it myself from a chiming bell
I heard one night in the fog
It tasted like a wish so I’m giving you this
Every Chance
Where is the faith in this sorrow, in this time?
Where have the gods gone when I need one most
I had every chance, even now if chose to try
But the wind hits me with my broken thoughts
and the blood I spilled
Drowning in time and memories follow
to wring every sigh from my wasted life
Where have the gods gone now that I need one most?
I had every chance, even now if I chose to try
But the wind hits me with my broken thoughts
and the blood I spilled to reach this low
Angels called and I looked away
My heart beckoned so I cut it out
Time surrounds me and pulls me down
the Bloodist
What’s thicker than blood? Not much
Touch me and you’ve touched a piece of you
Carry that high like a perfect feeling
rushing over your life
You will meet this again when the waters flow away
and I’m still here
Blood is thicker than water
Jealous of Me
Just as I sit small in this room
A candle lit in a mouth that breathes so slow
My other life is jealous of me
To speak is to break the divining signs
A lush invasion tries to force my hand
My other life is jealous of me
and I’ll shame my mansion to change
Isn’t It Sweet
I don’t want you crazy, I want you whole
to speak with your entire mind, to speak to me
Isn’t it new that we try to walk past the wars outiside
This is life isn’t sweet
Do we belong here, is this what we think it is?
The furnace of the world, a trick to trap us here
Isn’t it new that we try to find out what its all about
This is life isn’t it sweet
the Ghost Reasons With Me
I want you to stand aside
I want you to walk through
I want you to fake it
I want you to
Be savage for my sake
Be callous for yours
Be a challenge for always
before the doors close
Talk louder than I can
Talk farther away
Talk down the falling man
Talk him into his grave
Forget to wonder
Forget to calm down
Forget to know me
For always we’re crowned
What did you leave behind you
What do you want to leave
What fortune was found here
What chance did you give to me
Another Set of Rules for Houdstooth Pulsar 2009
Arms
Your tears drench my shirt, I am wet with your sadness
I tear along the mark and, unhinged, your body falls
I’d love to catch you in time if my arms were mine
Face
Yeah, I used to have a face but I’m better less that mess
Too beautiful to be was me, a cicatrix of serious
I used to have a waist and gaudy gams to match
I’d swing my stuff like lady luck
an easy bird to catch
Feel free to feel me
Calm down boys. None of this goes around. We all want me, baby, we all do.
The other world under this skirt
isn’t big enough for the both of us
Take turns dreaming the fool’s dream
A salacious feast of delicious me
Feel free to feel me
You can say that twice sailor. You might just be my lucky little boy.
Anachronisms
I haven’t inherited a great treasure
just a split barrel spilling over with anachronisms
and defunct theories of Will
My possessions refract from a canyon of blood
eroded as deep as memory and sin
They will not be my legacy
these things will not be my burden
My burden is to defy and strike
to kick platitudes out of bed
and stare long at the intricate nests
fleeting dreams wove in my hair
Then, to tell you if it means anything
My burden is to unloosen the bands grafting us
to the resemblance of a past
none of us has ever known
My burden is the future
and to find you there, beautiful
Executioner
I met my executioner, she was an intuition
We were impelled by phenomenon beyond us
Like a hair shirt burning on a sinner’s back
Ignited by longing for the Holy Flame
“How strange to meet you here. You mus be very beautiful.”
I tried to stop her from ending me again
from changing my facts and changing my shape
If I left her alone she would build a pathway
to destiny for us both
She was either frightening or profane
bruised by delicate understanding
She waits for me on the execution range saying:
“How strange to meet you here again”
I won’t believe I’ve been caught
by an unmasked catastrophe
She waits for me on the lip of the blood-ditch saying:
“How strange to meet you here. You must be very beautiful.”
Hold On
You tried really haven’t you
but never saw a cent of what you blew
to keep the hope alive
that this wasn’t just a joke
Hold on, now let go
So, you broke a heart or two
on the way to find a friend who you could screw
Hold on, hold on
I afraid to say
shame never saved anyone
You know where all of this is leading to
Breaking down everyone among you
Hold on, hold on
This won’t be fun
The train is leaving
Peace be to all of those who stepped aside
especially if they were taken by surprise
Hold on, hold on
Everyone will get the chance to dance away
into their graves
Mountains of dust decide
to make other shapes in other minds
None of them are yours, you never understood
and this isn’t the time to try
Hold on, hold on, hold on
Now let go
Out to Sea
No fairy tales for this lost boy
he just lost in the forest
and a wolf will swallow him whole
Watch closely as he shows his fear
There’s no magic in the way he
cries to be found
You’re wrong if you think
this means nothing to me
Ride your mind out to sea
Insects listen as he loses his way
soon they will taste his body
and have no recollection
So many have died tonight
we will listen and try to remember their names
You’re wrong if you think
this means nothing to me
I’m a slave to an idea
That never lets me sleep, never lets me dream
or ride my mind out to sea
Won’t You Try?
Do what you want to, what you want to do
if you really try… huh?
Or descend, I’m a master of that as well
You’re a miracle; you’re a mirror, girl
Why did you steal my chair
and why won’t you leave me alone?
Won’t you try?
Or descend, I’m a master of that as well
You’re a miracle; you’re a mirror girl
Lonely War
I’m fighting a lonely war
against the time it took for me to walk away
And the simple truth that stands aside
caring nothing for the storm coming our way
Watch out here comes the End
touch it now to know it when you become it
Please let me feel something new
Something that means we’re not lost to time
dying like creatures do
Pressure’s mounting to be relevant
Sorry things are said and meant when tongues are tied
What if I just want to sit and think alone
does that mean I don’t feel enough to deserve to cry
I wish I’d never hear the wind again
until our breath carries the blame away
Please let me feel something new
Something that means we’re not lost to time
dying like creatures do
Breaking bones over the rim of Hell’s divide
Half is here and half is where you chose to stay
Home will never be as it was before
Dangerous arms surround you when you’re lost to lies
Watch out, here comes the end
Tired?
Aren’t you tired of trying
of fighting a careless tomorrow?
We don’t matter to Him
remember that in your masterpiece of hate
Is this what it means to care about the world
to believe in what you see
To know your place seems to be to embrace
the ultimate humility
Aren’t you tired of it never being
just a little bit about you?
The centuries cloud you
and steal your meaning
Is this what it means to care about the world
to believe in what you see
To know your place seems to be to embrace
the ultimate humility
To Come
I’m not sure what else to say to you
I’m not sure how to convey
that with another lapse we will both collapse
much farther than we already have
This means something
it was all that I could beg
The rest is tied so tightly
I could wrestle no more free from us
This means more than you can imagine
to say aloud, “I am lost.” with resolve
But admission won’t deliver
the peace coming to me
There’s too far still to go
to rest and lick my wounds
I’m afraid its just beginning
and my handle on things is not strong
With a wish I commit myself to this:
that the promise will come
Brokedown
We need one more witness to size up the storm
because no one will talk to the judge anymore
He brings pieces to the tent to deceive what’s left
His cause isn’t hopeless, just little more than meaningless
I got calls to make when this is done
to anyone and any one
who can tell me just what the fuck is wrong with this
to this brokedown bum
We share a taste for pain if you believe what’s said
my heart isn’t in it to go around this again
An autopsy shows who’s in, who’s out
Here’s a dime, go start a life as far away as you can
Oh no, its happening again
Two unrepresented years
(To explain the two missing years: In 2010 I severely broke an ankle and was bedridden for months. I recorded very little new material during that time, however, once recovered I assembled the Black Market Butchers to produce a stage show and record the soundtrack with the wonderful producer John Porter . The soundtrack. In Time was selected from material on previous records, a kind of “Greatest Hits” which were rerecorded with a fifteen member band under glamorous conditions thanks to Upperninth Records. OffBeat magazine honored us with a Rock Album of the Year nomination. After devoting a few years to the project I returned to solo work in my little home studio of accumulated junk and produced the first version of A Wooden Nickel on Fire. Around the date of completion I was given the opportunity to take over running the Rookery Studio and presented with the option of remixing/tweaking it on much better equipment than I’d ever had access to. I spent the better part of a year doing that. It was released in 2012 and also received a Rock Album of the Year nomination from Offbeat Magazine.)
A Wooden Nickel on Fire 2012
Cheap Suit
Write your story here, on this little piece of sky
Where it will stay longer than you will
need to know anything
There’s no reason now to keep your enemies near
Take off that cheap suit and walk out of here
The past will bury the past
the way it always has
Is there a place where no one dies
Where there are no gunshots in the night
Maybe somewhere, someplace close
There’s no reason now to keep your enemies near
Take off that cheap suit and walk out of here
The past will bury the past
the way is always has
Start
Bring me to the brink of things
a broken line describing loss
a favor asked when all is gone
except the chance of living on
The lightening isn’t terrifying
How I miss my ignorance
when Devils fought over the sky
against the light that humbled them
I tear myself in half for this
to see and also shield that sense
to speak and not disrupt the silence
a perfect silence hardly kept
Bring me to the end of Me
where Forever hotly begs
To lay next to my naked self
and lie about what happens next
You wait all of your life to stop
and then it starts all over again
all over again, all over again, all over again…
Weapons
This is no way to start a night
without my shoes or a reason to live
You will be surprised what can be survived
When it happens again I’ll be ready with weapons
Walk backwards down the snake
until you find the head, then lower yourself in
This is no way for the night to end
Staring out of the window, into the night
hoping I’ll explode
You will be surprised what can be survived
When it happens again I’ll be ready with weapons Pulling On Golem’s Locks
Maybe now its time
before the sun has dried
our shape leather hard
and a face can still be changed
without breaking it apart
The moment is here
when we are meant to insist
we aren’t finished
and step back on the wheel
with the others
Dirty Strokes
Its savage and you have to let it
into the machine that means you
past the last place hope can go
Where bells chime only for dirty strokes
and naked shadows wrestle in
the light that fell from high to make them
The myth we schemed was a conceit
arrogance smearing the real thing
like a boot-polish moustache
dribbling down oblivion’s chin
Voice 1: Try
Voice 2: Are we the only
Voice 3: Its savage and you have to let it
V1: to pray
V2: animals to wonder
V3: into the machine that means you
V1: our way
V2: on the war field
V3: past the last place hope can go
V1: out of this
V2: of fallen others
V3: where bells chime only for dirty strokes
Don’t Tell
What kind of life am I leading
when eating a man is as easy as needing to
Touching his face is another way
to win the shell game
without falling down from dizziness
“Don’t tell anyone. I’ll say you made it up.”
Mistake
Swear to me there are no more lies after this
No more deceptions for my benefit
You lie awake half the night trying to face it
that’s what a mistake is
Is It Over?
What if the world already ended years ago
and we’re just slow to notice any change
It crept by in the night, a silent catastrophe
without a sigh or fire from the sky
The rest of us left are restless
watching it all fall apart
Have we always been this way
the more we know the worse off we are
This is the last time I’m going to think of this
about losing what I want to what I don’t
You can have the starless night and swallow it
for all I care, I’m finished when I’m done
The rest of us left are restless
watching it all fall apart
Have we always been this way
the more we know the worse off we are
Voiceless
What does it mean to be on my mind
standing alone in burning light
casting shadows on a life
shaped like me, unmoving
As I draw a final breath
I’m afraid of what’s coming next
I slip into a pretty dress
and wait for the room to dim
Voiceless, we cast our shadows
Behind us is a finished bridge
we crossed it to arrive at this
listening to stories carefully unfolding
Twelve paces from a marksman’s shot
eyes closed tight, I drop my gun
lay bare my chest and clear my thoughts
ready for anything
Voiceless, we cast our shadows
Remorseless, looking on
through the eyes and tears
and chances and chaos that made us
Bananas
I’m not kiwis about you baby
I’m not tangerines about you baby
I’m not pommegranites about you baby
I’m bananas about you baby
(my puppy howls “I love you”)
I’m not watermelons about you baby
I’m not grapefruits about you baby
I’m not blueberries about you baby
I’m bananas about you baby
(my puppy’s refrain)
I’m not honeydew melons about you baby
I’m not artichokes about you baby
I’m not pickles about you baby
I’m bananas about you baby
As is often the case I wrote some of the songs for the next CD toward the end of working on the previous one, but when A Wooden Nickel on Firewas released I had another project lined up producing for Hip-Hop artist, Nikka B. We created Poison Girl Inc over the following year as I silmultaneously developed my next body of songs, An Exciting Excising. It was held for release until after Nikka’s project was out. Chomping at the bit, I made three solo CDs over 2013 into early 2014; neither of the other two contribute material to this page because Posterity Stares at Me is an instrumental and deathchildren is a musical adaption of a long form poem written by my dear friend Mac Taylor.
An Exciting Excising 2014
You’re Better Than This
Leave some hope behind
it will grow and find you later when you’re better than this
like a kiss blown through a bad dream
All your lies were told under sheets
A lesson learned well from the queen of the jail
Like a god you spoke a skeleton key, now think free
A voice rings pristine in your ear
It’s a future, a claw mark, a faultline
“You’re better than this, you’re better than this
If Death is impatient make him wait with the rest.”
You wear naked nicely
Not even a smoke ring could stand between
the skin we carry over our shoulders
Here is your hope, a charging horse on fire
His mane made of snakes
his reins of barbed wire
“You’re better than this you’re better than this
If Death is impatient make him wait with the rest.”
Godiva Golightly
I took a whore bath in the holy water
Then I bought some jail-nails from the prison mortician
I called in a favor from a show-horse who owes me first borns
and now I’m coming on a comet’s tail
the sky don’t show me no friction
I am the plague in the knave and I’ve decided
I’m looking for a woman named Godiva Golightly
She won’t be able to shake me once I have tasted
I’m coming in a comet’s tail
to sweep her off of her faces
I’ll tell her there aren’t any rules
only the people who think there are
and those are the fools she has to watch out for
With her feet screwed to the plank she won’t be diving for dimes
I’ve come in comet’s tail
to rescue her from last time
A Handful of Handsome
Gimme peace I say!
Something to smooth out the road
to the bat-shit wizard smearing wisdom
on his prison cell walls
“I’m a handful of handsome.”
says the sexed up monkey making mischief on the boat
he’s got Delicious by the throat and the safe word is “Don’t”
This is what you get
for finally wasting somebody you didn’t like
It gets you swinging by the neck
I hope you like the noose
we bought it just for you
Can’t wait to see you in it
it’s the perfect length to end it
The Monkey’s got you now
pulling on your shoes, pulling you delicious
right out of your suspicions, go ahead and say it: Don’t
How many gone? 20, 40, forget me?
I’m sure you’re keeping count
excuse my intrusion
I see you missing fingers
so I wonder how you do it, don’t say with your mind
it only knows how to stumble inches at a time
Dance with me chief!
this is how we think, a fossilized jackboot
death marching just because the laces were a little late
This is what you get
for finally wasting somebody you didn’t like
It gets you swinging by the neck
I hope you like the noose
we bought it just for you
Can’t wait to see you in it
It’s the perfect length to end it
I’m Fine, Thanks
There was a terrible crash, dreams died
Someone took hold of my hand
and made me stand
I looked around and saw
clipped wings and fallen stars
and then your arms
leading me back to the world
I’m fine, thanks
I’m fine thanks to you
Forget You Know Me
Take your clothes off slowly
and forget you know me
No one is watching, take your clothes off
People in the next room are in the next room
and have nothing to do with this, let’s do it
Take your clothes slowly
and forget you know me
An Exciting Excising
Who do we think we are with rockets spilling from our mouths
like drugged up shamans willing to follow any animal around
The curse of being us doesn’t belong in this little room
where my make-up can bleed and there’s no one to answer to
Your awkwardness meets me, so cunning you could eat me
Show off your tiger’s wink and I’ll put puppets in the sea
They’ll be pirates without strings free to chase lightening strikes
and sink any feeling that tries to bring them to “Life”
Hate me I don’t care, worries were made for others to bear
I look outside to count the clouds and find everything upside down
A sphere sweating an electric net spinning against prayers to stop it
Then I see the pillow creases on your cheek, exotic scars from the land of sleep
Your nightgown just a little high, enough to let me know you want to play
Who do we think we are, living on desire
like our bodies don’t have clocks and move like rainbows on water
I’ll tell you who I am if you believe I am trying
and I’ll trust you to tell me if I seem to be lying
If a world is on fire it belongs to someone else
This one is ours and we live in it well
Hate me I don’t care, worries were made for others to bear
This will be an exciting excising
The closing song, Leave Some Hope Behind, is lyrically identical to the opening track, You’re Better Than This. After I completed writing the lyric it occurred to me that its message could be construed a few very different ways so I endeavored to exercise that possibility by creating one song which is aggressive and accusatory, then another which is hopeful and uplifting.
To be continued………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
ratty scurvics 