• LYRICS
CRUEL AUGUST MOON (CDR)
also known as “I Take A Chance Every Time”
Little Hands, November 18, 2000
Spring
Twelve bells call to wake us up
Three more send us back to sleep
The first days saw us give up our wings
In exchange for things we couldn’t keep
By your side I felt taller than any city
By your side I fell farther than any could see
Twelve bells call to ring us in
That we may begin
Write your name beside my own
In the new mud of spring
By your side I felt smaller than any sea crab
By your side I fell I slower and slower.
Last Night I Fell Asleep On Your Floor
(see also: Saturday Looks Good To Me)
Last night I fell asleep on your floor
You slid candy underneath the door
When I asked you to take me to the store
I woke up and you just gave me more
Do you believe it’s any coincidence
The more you need the more you have to spend?
We only eat what we can afford
Haven’t you seen
Socialized medicine under lock and key
Kept out of hungry hands
To keep us sick and eating out of cans?
The cheapest, most accessible food
Is the kind that’s worst for them and you.
Car Crash
(see also: Saturday Looks Good To Me)
You can drive past everybody in your car
Over these streets that hold you up
And still remember who you are
You can crash through picture windows
And crush corners of the room
You can call it quits too soon
But will you wait another year
For the ghosts in the room to disappear?
You can send back every letter
That there is to be sent back
Every photograph and memory, every scrap
Until the past is torn in dotted lines
Until the past is torn in half
Do you believe that you can see through sleep
And over secret walls
And hold it all in your hands
And not wake up
And run like rain runs
Out of the gutters of this town
But never drown?
I Take A Chance Every Time
(see also: Saturday Looks Good To Me)
I take a chance every time that I call you over
That evidence may unwind all the lies you told me
I hear you singing all the way
Down old service drives and empty alleyways
Drive like rain
Waiting on the rails
I take a chance every time that I call you over
That my best wishes will reduce themselves to tired reminders.
Save My Life
And I had faith that you could save my life
And because there were stars in your eyes.
School
I don’t care about school anymore
I can’t hear the bells or rockets
Locked behind your eyes
You’re talking to yourself
And I’m walking home
As cold as snow
As cold as rain can get
Twice as cold
I don’t care about tomorrow
Or any other time
I can’t hear the sound of the ballroom
Just that there are voices trapped inside
Dancing out of view and out of time
Time we can’t get back now
No one knows how.
Postmark
X-Rays of bicycles
Postcards of planes
Silent sentimentalities
Faded along with the date
You were the first on the list
That read like a syllabus of persons most missed
Nervous, however ridiculous
To sign in ink
In the distance made plain
All lack the words to pacify
The weapons of worry
The crackling fire disguised as time
Sleeping in halves
Despite photographs that line the walls
As thin as the paper on which it is written
The evidence that you’ve not been forgotten
With little more proof than a postmark.
Your Winter
Holding together with glue
Pieces of particle-board and twine
A presentation past due
Outdated, misshapen valentine
I’ll send my winter to you
With the last of the ice early April melts
No point in being confused
Over old months collected and how misspent
Spring has been harder to see
Than at one point I might have believed
Light pulls itself into view
Weary eyes watch sunrise overfull
Sleep for an hour or two
If only in respect for the principle
Written in rain in a code designed to be unbreakable
At the bottom of the lake
In the center of town
Still covered with snow
Collected scraps and artifacts of some unsung history
Dragged from the frozen deeps while the neighborhood sleeps
For silent delivery
I’ll send my winter to you
If only to have someone to send it to.
Own
(see also: Sound On Sound)
Holding hands in parking lots
All of your friends are there
Rumors move quicker than regular talk
All of your friends will hear
Did you really walk all this way
Just to hear them say
“We don’t want to come out tonight.
But we will.. oh, we might.”
Holding hands with astronauts
All of your friends are there.
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