Diskographie & Lyrics

Can’t live today off that minimum wage unless you sleep on the factory floor
If there is anything great left in this sorry state it was built on the backs of the poor
So we buy and we sell for your corporate cartel and we vote when the contestant sings
A mind-control mix for our obedience, strong sleep-aids and hard energy drinks
Cause Freedom is not free
Neither is apathy

“Slay Goliath! Slay Goliath!”
The flashmob all held up their phones
But you cannot predict when the students riot
And a big machine always moves slow
So throw your little stone

You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
Expect us
We know what all of us know

You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
Expect us
We know what all of us know

A half-dozen cops came to seize a laptop from a sleeping fifteen year old kid
They broke down the door and discovered some more, a hundred million exactly like him
So we do not forgive and we do not forget, we are legion, expect us, you’ll see
The righteous will resist, underfed eat the rich and the data mines finally come clean
Cause Freedom is not free
And neither is secrecy

You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
Expect us
We know what all of us know

You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
You can’t stop us
We are Anonymous
Expect us
We know what all of us know

We know what Big Brother did
We’re the Tattletale
We’ll see your All-Seeing-Eye in hell

It begins when we chain ourselves to the ATMs
Make a mess when we pitch our tents on the statehouse steps
Now we’re taking it, now we’re taking it back
Now we’re taking it, now we’re taking it back
For the greater good
Goddamn Robin Hoods

Fan the flames, serve them cocktails down at the Stock Exchange
Hear the screams, take our baseball bats to the limousines
They’ll be talking us, they’ll be talking us up
They’ll be talking us, they’ll be talking us up
To the journalists
If there’s any left

You know the Sixties proved that change is hit or miss
Every bloody pacifist concedes the truth
If one must die to save the ninety-nine
Maybe it’s justified
The left is right
We’re doomed

My telephone, it doesn't have a camera
If it did I'd take a picture of myself
If it did I'd take a picture of the water
And the man on the offramp
Holding up the sign that's asking me for help
I got a job and I'll work here for the summer
I fold the towels and set them by the pool
Everyone looks happy with each other
'Til they step away and say the thing they really meant
They always sound so cruel
I didn't know what I was in for
When I signed up for that run
There's no way I'm curing cancer
But I'll sweat it out
I feel so proud now for all the good I've done
I know a girl who owns a boutique in the city
Selling clothes to the fashionably late
Says she cries at the news but doesn't really
'Cause it's too much fun, it's too much time
And too much plastic money to be made
I didn't know what I was in for
When they took my belt and strings
They told me I'd gone crazy
My arms are strapped in a straight jacket
So I couldn't save those TV refugees
When they're on their backs
In a bloody bath
Full of sarin gas
On a screen
I didn't know what I was in for
When I laid out in the sun
We get burned for being honest
I've really never done anything, for anyone
To fall asleep I need white noise to distract me
Otherwise I have to listen to me think
Otherwise I pace around, hold my breath, let it out
Sit on the couch and think about
How living's just a promise that I made

Like, it's, it's impossible to count
One, two, three, four
Drinking cold, black coffee
I shake and shake, still won't get off me
Another blissed out fantasy
Where animals and objects talk to me
Always try and hate it
But then you laugh, it sounds outrageous
Spend another day sleepwalking
Is this having fun?
Or is it just because?
Which one is jumping first
Off of the face of the earth?
You like beer and chocolate
I like setting off those bottle rockets
We can never compromise
But fighting 'til the death keeps us alive
Why don't you stay
If you're going to leave your car here anyway?
Spend another summer shit-talking
Is this having fun?
It's not like the way it was
I thought that you loved this stuff
Or did I make that up?
Act insane, playing it safe
I wasn't sold on that plan anyways
Feeling afraid of making a change
Hoping to last another day
I want there to stop the circular dots
Spinning in a world full of forget-me-nots
I gave what I got
It came as a shock
To find out I'm fine with what I've lost

It was quite early one morning
Hit me without warning
I went to hear the general speak
I was standing for the anthem
Banners all around him
Confetti made it hard to see
Put my footsteps on the pavement
Starved for entertainment
Four seasons of revolving doors
So sick of being honest
I'll die like Dylan Thomas
A seizure on the barroom floor
I'm getting greedy with this private hell
I'll go it alone, but that's just as well
These cats are scared and feral
The flag pins on their lapels
The truth is anybody's guess
These talking heads are saying
"The king is only playing a game of four dimensional chess"
There's flowers in the rubble
The weeds are gonna tumble
I'm lucid but I still can't think
I'm strapped into a corset
Climbed into your corvette
I'm thirsty for another drink
If it's advertised, we'll try it
And buy some peace and quiet
And shut up at the silent retreat
They say you've gotta fake it
At least until you make it
That ghost is just a kid in a sheet
I'm getting used to these dizzy spells
I'm taking a shower at the Bates Motel
I'm getting greedy with this private hell
I'll go it alone, but that's just as well

You should really call your brother
Someone put up a picture where he can't stand
He's holding onto the table
Probably throwing darts or playing cards
Something that he lost made him so mad
Always said it didn't matter
With a pile of filthy coins clenched in his hands
Asking strangers to forgive him
But he never told him what it is
He did to them that made him feel so bad
Say what you mean and say it now
Don't state your name, that doesn't count
Who are you?
Who are you-
Looking for?
Thought that he was doing better
A notice, final eviction, he just laughed
Always had a sense of humor
We still joked until the bitter end
While all those steps he made can't walk them back
In and out of indecision
In and out of any options he once had
Farewell, so long
'Til the trouble that you made and hate is gone
Say what you mean and say it now
Don't throw a fit, quit acting out
Who are you?
Who are you-
Waiting for?
Just go out into the falling snow
Just go towards the light in the skylight
Just go past the trucks on the service road
Just go until you feel different

You need an occupation
To warrant a vacation
Without anticipation
Nothing's satisfactory
I came out here to check out
Get away from my house
Now I don't leave this couch
Or turn off the TV
There's always an exemption
There's always an exception to the rule
Always an exemption
There's always an exception to the rule
Why don't you want it?
Why don't you want it anymore?
Why don't you want it?
Why don't you want it anymore?
I wanted to avoid it
Live out in the forest
Play out of that orbit
Go drifting out to sea
But fate just wouldn't have it
It treats us like a magnet
Mends my broken habits
And makes a fool of me
There's always an exemption
There's always an exception to the rule
Always an exemption

To a world we'll not remember
When we're old and tired
We'll be blowing on the embers of a little fire
We were the tallest person watching in Chesapeake
You put me on your shoulders so I could see
I was all covered in sound
Ear plugs so it wasn't loud
Swallowed up by the crowd
Didn't know what they were singing about
I can't hardly wait
For someone to replace
It was hot in the arena
Good men die like dogs
My hero plays to no one, in a parking lot
Even though there's no one around
He broke a leg and the house came down
A smattering of applause
A sliver moon and a cover song
Oh sweet child of mine
You're always sorry for everything, never apologize
Oh sweet child of mine
Now you stand on the corner and hope you get recognized
I was all covered in sound
When you asked me to turn it down
Didn't even think it was loud
Can you hear it now?

Looking out on the river bend
Looking out on the thing that isn't
Looking out on the freeway's push and pull
Looking out for the current
Little spells of forgetfulness
Little sounds that are shrill and urgent
Little insects that sting as they come and go
Little moments of purpose
I loved you
I wore you out
I miss you
Where are you now?
This town is a monolith
This town is a crowded movie
This town is a depot, I come and go
This town is my city
I hate you
I tore you down
I miss you
Where are you now?
Looking bad like those Vegas odds
Wear a smile like it's camouflage
Today was a smoking sky
Today was a civic menace
Today I went walking while things explode
Some sad independence
I want to be just as loud
All this freedom just freaks me out
Risk it all on the game of chance
Chasing love like an ambulance

You used to sing with a straight face "Que Sera, Sera"
And drive those perfumed queens back to our place in a velvet box
And then make your move
Since you went underground
I've wanted to track you down
Since you went underground
I've wanted to dig you out
You used to sing with a straight face "My Heart Will Go On"
And bring those tattoo'd freaks back to our place in a mason jar
You had something to prove
Since you went underground
I've wanted to track you down
Yeah, since you went underground
I've wanted to dig you out
You passed out quick
You lack ambition
Why does everybody always end up in the kitchen?
The man in white slacks sure looks dangerous
And I heard the short one's kind of famous
You used to say you wanted to end up in Forest Lawn
The two of us side by side asleep while the teenagers drink 'til dawn
Please tell me it's true
Since you went underground
I've wanted to track you down
Since you went underground
I've wanted to dig you out
You used to sing with a straight face "Que Sera, Sera"

Your black hair is red
I laughed when I saw your chest
You shook your head and pulled the curtains back, took in the view
Then you showed me the rest of you
And then I guess I thought I'd see the world
I guess I thought I would see the world
Your black heart is big
I'd ask you to cross but you'd never do it
But then again you stopped in the middle of the street
Just to kiss me, and I thought you'd stopped the world
I guess I thought you could stop the world
Alright, alright for now
Don't wanna think about it
I'm fine with hiding out
Alright, alright for now
I'll wrap my head around it
Make room for something else
Alright, alright for now
Don't wanna think about it
I'm fine with hiding out
Alright, alright for now
I'll wrap my head around it
Make room for something else
'Til then I'll hold it down

Can you hear the crickets?
All I hear is crickets
Like a river
Shining through the edges of my sight
The sky is pitch black, dark
Yet somehow really peaceful
At the same time
It gets dark in the morning
Trade sleep for drinks in a bar
I'm sure as hell my breath stinks
Watch it float like smoke in the fog
I can feel a tornado
And it's shivering up my arms
I've been playing dominoes
I'm just trying not to wreck no cars
Putting fear in my nose
And trying to keep up with all my thoughts
If we're going somewhere, I'm ready
If it's just dirt, I'm not
I scrape my eye when I touch the sky
And lose a little vision for the man
I can call it in my mind
I don't want to hold nobody's hand
I can toss in the morning light
I'll play dead when I'm buried in the sand
I'm seeing shadows of man a who's
Homeless, buried and numb
A forecast of forgotten land
I hope it shows up in the setting sun
If we're going somewhere, I'm ready, honey
If it's nowhere, I'm done
I can hear a voice but it's speaking code
(Poured concrete on top, concrete on top, concrete)
Like I'm talking to strangers on a foreign phone
I can talk to angels when I'm all alone
They take me to a place in the city
And when we're done they take me home
Can't find a forest with the singing birds
Instead I'm just a low voice in the crowd
Can't hear my own voice in this crowd
I get edgy on dark streets
Coming home, I feel my heartbeat
I say I'm stoned for the last time
I do it again and repeat
I'm carpooling to kingdom come
Into the wild purgatory
Experience in a magic rainbow
All you got to do is follow
And if you're not feeling ready
There's always tomorrow
And if you're not feeling ready
There's always tomorrow

Corporate or Colonial
The Movement is unstoppable
Like the body of a centerfold it spreads
To the counter-culture copyright
Get your revolution at a lower price
Or make believe and throw the fight, play dead
It's exploding bags, aerosol cans
Southbound buses, Peter Pan
They left it up to us again
I thought you knew the drill
It's kill or be killed

Future Markets, Holy Wars
Been tried ten thousand times before
If you think that God is keeping score, Hooray!
For the freedom-fighting simulcast (Victory! A defeat! Victory!)
The imminent and the aftermath
Draw another bloody bath to drain
Like the polar icecaps centrifuge (Oh Allah! Oh Jesus please!)
First snowman built at the end of June
He slicks his hair for the interview, his fifteen-minute fame
Would you agree times have changed?

Your class, your caste, your country, sect, your name or your tribe
There's people always dying trying to keep them alive
His body's decomposing in containers tonight
In an abandoned building where

A squatter's made a mural of a Mexican girl
With fifteen cans of spray paint and a chemical swirl
She's standing in the ashes at the end of the world
Four winds blowing through her hair

But when great Satan's gone, the whore of Babylon
She just can't sustain the pressure where it's placed
She caves

The Bible's blind, the Torah's deaf, the Qu'ran's mute
If you burn them all together you get close to the truth still
They are pouring over sanskrit on the ivy league moons
While shadows lengthen the sun

Cast off the schools of meditation built to soften the times
And hold us at the center while the spiral unwinds
It's knocking over fences, crossing property lines
Four winds, cry until it comes

And it's the son of man
Slouching towards Bethlehem
A heart just can't contain all of that empty space
It breaks, it breaks, it breaks

Well, I went back to my rented Cadillac and company jet
Like a newly orphaned refugee, retracing my steps
All the way to Cassadaga to commune with the dead
They said, "You'd better look alive"

And I was off to old Dakota where a genocide sleeps
In the black hills, the bad lands, the calloused east
I buried my ballast, I made my peace
With four winds, levelling the pines

But when great Satan's gone, the whore of Babylon
She just can't compete with all that outer space
She breaks, she breaks, she caves, she caves

When panic grips your body and your heart is a hummingbird
Raven thoughts blacken your mind until you're breathing in reverse
All your friends and sedatives mean well but make it worse
Every reassurance just magnifies the doubt
Better find yourself a place to level out

Got a cricket for a conscience always looks the other way
A cocaine soul starts seeming like an empty cabaret
Hey, where have all the dancers gone? Now the music doesn't play
Tried to listen to the river but you couldn't shut your mouth
Better take a little time to level out

I never thought of running
My feet just led the way

Mixed up Signals
Bullet Train
Cars are switched out in the crazy rain
I could meet you any place
If the Brakeman turns my way

All this automatic writing I have tried to understand
From a psychedelic angel who was tugging on my hand
It's an infinite coincidence but it doesn't form a plan
So I'm headed for New England or the Paris of the South
Gonna find myself somewhere to level out

Are your brothels full, Oh Babylon, with merry Middlemen?
Never peer out of their periscopes from those deep opium dens
All this death must need a counterweight always someone born again
First a mother bathes her child then the other way around
The Scales always find a way to level out

I tried to pass for nothing
But my dreams gave me away

Mixed up Signals
Bullet Train
People snuffed out in the brutal rain
I could live to any age
If the Brakeman turns my way

It is an old world it's hard to remember
Like a dime store mystery
I'm a repeat first time offender
Who has rewritten history

Mixed up tea leaves
Phantom Pain
Fuzzy logic in the crazy rain
Getting better every day
If the Brakeman turns my way
Mixed up Signals
Bullet Train
Cars are switched out in the blinding rain
He'll be smiling as he seals my fate
When the Brakeman turns my way

The Wife forgave the Mistress for she only entertained
The pain was gone the instant she cleared her throat to speak her name
Said, "Both of us must suffer from the same unending ache"

The world was not of interest though her days were never dull
Her bed beneath a crucifix on guests performing miracles
With the Son of God just hanging like a common criminal
When I do wrong I am with God, she thought
When I feel lost I am not at all

So give me Black Light (Give Give me)
So give me Hot Knives (Deep Clean sleep)
On a dance floor no one tells time (There is no time)

Oh, I've made love, yeah, I've been fucked, so what?
I'm a cartoon, you're a full moon, let's stay up

She went to see a Mystic who made medicine from rain
And gave up her existence to feel everything, dream others' dreams
Bid farewell to her family with one ecstatic wave (Please take care I love you all)
Out the window as the car rolled away
She just vanished into a thick mist of change

So let us rejoice (Let's Rejoice!)
In all this Pink Noise (Out Pink Noise!)
An oscillation that we can pin point (We're right here!)

I heard you're scheming new pyramids
Another big idea to get you rich
Make a plan to love me sometime soon

You said you had your foot in the door
You buy and you sell, you buy some more
Make a plan to love me sometime soon

Life is too short
Death doesn't ask
It don't owe you that

Some things you lose
You don't get back
So just know what you have

And make a plan to love me sometime soon

Life is Too $hort
To be a fool
I don't owe you that

Do what you feel
Whatever is cool
But I just have to ask

First you want to ride off into the Sun
Then you want to shoot straight to the Moon
Make a plan to love me sometime soon

When you are young the world is a Ferris Wheer
I know we will grow old it is lovely, still
Make a plan to love me sometime soon

Will you make a plan to love me?

See the Soul Singer in the session band
Shredded to ribbons beneath a microphone stand
Felt the quickness of pity like a flash in a pan
For the Soul Singer in the session band

Now a red carpet bagger makes a Blackberry call
To the plastic piranhas in the city of salt
Wasted wheat paste campaign post no bills on the wall
You mean nothing to no one but that's nobody's fault

See the Soul Singer in the session band
Shredded to ribbons beneath a microphone stand
Felt the quickness of pity like a flash in a pan
For the Soul Singer in the session band

I had a lengthy discussion about The Power of Myth
With a post-modern author who didn't exist
In this fictitious world all reality twists
I was a hopeless romantic now I'm just turning tricks

Just like that Soul Singer in the session band
Shredded confetti beneath a microphone stand
Saw the Conflict of Interest slipping cash in the hand
Of the Soul Singer in the session band

His room is on fire since he painted it red
There are a stranger's silk sequins at the foot of the bed
He has been to weddings and funerals but he still never wept
Now sorrow is pleasure when you want it instead

Just like the Soul Singer in the session band
Wailed like an infant atop a white baby grand
We'll need every sand bag and every man
To save the Soul Singer in the session band

Headlights or Taillights it's a flip of a coin
I have been coming and going since the day I was born
And I followed the breadcrumbs but I never got home
I grew old in an instant now I am all on my own

Just like that Soul Singer in the session band
Shredded to nothing beneath the microphone stand
Saw the wave of the future through the crack of the dam
Drowned the Soul Singer in the session band
Bless the Soul singer in the session band

She was a real royal lady, true patron of the arts
She said the best country singers die in the back of classic cars
So if I ever got too hungry for a suitcase or guitar
To think of them all alone in the dark
So I laid some nights beside her in a bed made for a queen
She said I kissed her different, that all the men her age were mean
Gave me anything I wanted, Oh the generosity
I took all that I could, it was free
Now the sky is a torn up denim and the clouds are just splattered paint
It's a room I'm renovating; it's a name I got to change
If I get out of California I'm going back to my home state
To tell them all that I made a mistake

And I keep looking for that blindfold faith
Lighting candles to a cynical saint
Who wants the last laugh at the fly trapped in the windowsill tape
You can go right out of your mind trying to escape
From the panicked paradox of day to day
If you can't understand something then it's best to be afraid

The whole world it loves you if you are a chic chameleon
Intersecting circles she could hang with anyone
But when conducting business she would lie about where she's from
Saying, "Life is how it is not how it was"
I learned to listen felt like I was back at school
She'd talk forever about the phases of the moon
Saying, "Everything is a cycle, you've got to let it come to you
And when it does, you will know what to do"
Without even knowing I guess I took her advice
Painted her front door it seemed a suitable goodbye
It's not that often but I think of her sometimes
Just something quaint, a couple ships in the night

And they keep moving at a glacial pace
Turning circles in a memory maze
I made a new cast of the death mask that is gonna cover my face
I had to change the combination to the safe
Hide it all behind a wall let people wait
And never trust a heart that is so bent it can't break

I traveled though the atmosphere as a wall of feedback climbed
The pegs were gold, the band was old, they played in half time
Now every dream gets whittled down just like every fool gets wise
You will never reap of any seed deprived of sunlight

So I have become the Middleman
The gray areas are mine
The in-between, the absentee
Is a beautiful disguise

So I keep my footlights shining bright just like I keep my exits wide
'Cause I never know when it's time to go, it's too crowded now inside
The dead can hide beneath the ground and the birds can always fly
But the rest of us do what we must in constant compromise

So I have become the Middleman
The gray areas are fine
The "I don't know," the "maybe so"
Is the only real reply
It is the only true reply

Hear the chimes, did you know that the wind when it blows
It is older than Rome and all of this sorrow
See the new pyramids down in old Manhattan
From the roof of a friend's I watched an empire ending
Heard it loud and long the river's Om
Time marching on to a madman's drum

Don't forget what you've learned all you give is returned
And if life seems absurd what you need is some laughter
And a season to sleep and a place to get clean
Maybe Los Angeles, somewhere no one is expecting
On a detox loft through a Glendale Park over sidewalk chalk
Someone wrote in red, "start over"
So I muffled my scream on an Oxnard beach
Full of fever dreams that scare you sober
Into saltless dinners

Take the fruit from the tree, break the skin with your teeth
Is it bitter or sweet? All depends on your timing
Like a meeting of chance with the train station glance
Many lifetimes had past in a instant reminded
Of a millstone house in a seaside town
When your heart gave out in a mission bed
So your wife gave birth to a funeral dirge
You woke up purged as a wailing infant
In Krug Thep, Thailand

Hear the chimes, did you know that the wind when it blows
It is older than Rome and our joy and our sorrow

Death may come, invisible
Or in a holy wall of fire
In the breath between the markers
On some black I-80 mile

From the madness of the governments
To the vengeance of the sea
Everything is eclipsed
By the shape of destiny

So love me now
Hell is coming
Could you do it now?
Hell is here

Little soldier, little insect
You know war, it has no heart
It will kill you in the sunshine
Or just as happily in the dark

Well, kindness is a card game
Or a bent-up cigarette
In the trenches, in the hard rain
With the bullet and the bit

He says help me out
Hell is coming
Just kiss my mouth
Hell is here

Do you see the sterile soil
Poisoned sky
Yellow water
The final scraps of life
Bringing new tears

Wake, baby, wake
Leave that blanket around you
There's no where we're safe

I'm leaving this place
But there's nothing
I'm planning to take

Just you

Just you
Just you
Just you
Just you

Shrill as a choir of children
Urgent like the first day of May
False and inflatable feeling
Tugs at my senses, big as the Macy's Parade
One brick on top of another
Such is the measure of man
Planets are inset like diamonds
On a gravity halo, eternity's wedding band
I slept with that dealer all summer
The ecstasy is still in my spine
Coat Check I couldn't remember
Walked into the winter, came out on the other side

In the South the sun is shining
Back in the East the lights went out

Stuck on a ladder to heaven
On trial way back in The Hague
Lullaby sounds from the engine
In my Styrofoam coffin, asleep on the interstate
Black globes, old symbols of freedom
A murderer still on the lam
Cities encircled in iron
On a great silver beltway, democracy's shackled hands
Seance that brought us together
Objects we move with our minds
Coat Check and I lost the number
Short sleeves in the winter, fell back through the other side

Out in the West the cars are crashing
Up in the North the ice gave out

Saada Tekmel B'Lhouria...
Houria...

Leave the bright blue door on the whitewashed wall
Leave the death ledger under city hall
Leave the joyful air in that rubber ball today

Leave the lilac print on the linen sheet
Leave the birds you killed at your father's feet
Let the sideways rain and the crooked street remain

Leave the whimpering dog in his cold kennel
Leave the dead starlet on her pedestal
Leave the acid kids in their green fishbowls today

Just leave the sad guitar in its hardshell case
Leave the worried look on your lover's face
Let the orange embers in the fireplace remain

Everything it must belong somewhere
A train off in the distance, bicycle chained to the stairs
Everything it must belong somewhere
I know that now, that is why I'm staying here

Leave the ocean's roar in the turquoise shell
Leave the widower in his private hell
Leave the liberty in that broken bell today

Leave the epic poem on its yellowed page
Leave the grey macaw in its covered cage
Let the traveling band on the interstate remain

Everything it must belong somewhere
Sound stage in California, televisions in Times Square
Everything it must belong somewhere
I know that now that is why I'm staying here
Yeah, I know that now, that is why I'm staying here

Leave the secret talks on the trundle bed
Leave the garden tools in that rusted shed
Leave those bad ideas in your troubled head today

Leave the restless ghost in his old hotel
Leave the homeless man in that cardboard cell
Let the painted horse on the carousel remain

Everything it must belong somewhere
Just like the gold around her finger or the silver in his hair
Everything it must belong somewhere
I know that now, that's why I'm staying here
I know that now, that's why I'm staying here

In truth the forest hears each sound
Each blade of grass as it lies down
The world requires no audience
No witnesses, no witnesses

Leave the old town drunk on his wooden stool
Leave the autumn leaves in their swimming pool
Leave the poor black child in his crumbling school today

Leave the novelist in his daydream tune
Leave the scientist in his Rubik's cube
Let the true genius in the padded room remain

Leave the horse's hair on the slanted bow
Leave the slot machines on the riverboat
Leave the cauliflower in the casserole today

Leave the hot bright trash in the shopping malls
Leave the hawks of war in their capitol
Let the organ's moan in the cathedral remain

Everything it must belong somewhere
They locked the Devil in the basement, threw God up into the air
Everything it must belong somewhere
And you know it's true, I wish you'd leave me here
You know it's true, why don't you leave me here?

I keep floating down the river but the ocean never comes
Since the operation I heard you're breathing just for one
Now everything is imaginary, especially what you love
You left another message said it's done,
It's done

When I hear beautiful music it's always from another time
Old friends I never visit, I remember what they're like
Standing on a doorstep full of nervous butterflies
Waiting to be asked to come inside
Just come inside

But I keep going out
I can't sleep next to a stranger when I'm coming down
It's 8 a.m. my heart is beating too loud
Too loud
Don't be so amazing or I'll miss you too much
I felt something that I had never touched

Everything gets smaller now the further that I go
Towards the mouth and the reunion of the Known and the Unknown
Consider yourself lucky if you think of it as home
You can move mountains with your misery if you don't
If you don't

It comes to me in fragments, even those still split in two
Under the leaves of that old Lime Tree I stood examining the fruit
Some were ripe and some were rotten, I felt nauseous with the truth
There will never be a time more opportune

So I just won't be late
The window closes, shock rolls over in a tidal wave
And all the color drains out of the frame
So pleased with a daydream that now living is no good
I took off my shoes and walked into the woods
I felt lost and found with every step I took

Death
Data entry
Ant hill law
Encoded arc our common cause
Drink liquid clocks 'til I see God
Crystal display
Can't turn it off
Shh...shh...shhhh
Don't talk
Don't talk

It was Don Delillo, whiskey, neat
And a blinking midnight clock
Speakers on a tv stand, just a turntable to watch
When the smoke came out our mouths
On all those hooded sweatshirt walks
You were a stroke of luck
We were a goldmine and they gutted us

And from the sidelines
You see me run
Until I'm out of breath
Living the good life
I left for dead
The sorrowful midwest
Well I did my best
To keep my head

It was grass-stained jeans and incompletes
And a girl from class to touch
But you think about yourself too much
And you ruin who you love
Well all these claims at consciousness
My stray dog freedom
Let's have a nice clean cut
Like a bag we buy and divvy up

And from the sidelines
I see you run
Until you're out of breath
And all those white lines that sped us up
We hurry to our death
Well I lagged behind
So you got ahead

You can make a plan
Carve it into stone
Like a feather falling
That is still unknown

Until the clock speaks up
Says it's time to go
You can choose the high
Or the lower road

You might clench your fist
You might fork your tongue
As you curse or praise
All the things you've done

And the faders move
And the music dies
As we pass over
On the arc of time

So you'll nurse your love
Like a wounded dove
In the covered cage of night
Every star is crossed
By frenetic thoughts
They separate and then collide

And they twist like sheets
Till you fall asleep
And they finally unwind
It's a black balloon
It's a dream you'll soon
Deny

I hear if you make friends
With Jesus Christ
You'll get right up
From that chalk outline

And then you'll get dolled up
And you'll dress in white
All to take your place
In his chorus line

And then in you'll come
With those marching drums
In a saintly compromise
No more whiskey slurs
No more blonde hair girls
For your whole eternal life
And you'll do the dance
That was choreographed
At the very dawn of time
Singing "I told you son
The day would come
You would die, you die, you die, you die..."

To the deepest part
Of the human heart
The fear of death expands
Till we crack the code
We've always known
But could never understand
On a circuit board
We'll soon be born
Again, again, again, again

I heard you fell into a rabbit hole
Covered yourself up in snow
Baby tell me where to go for days and days
Did they make you stay up all night
Did they paint your face that pasty white
You're thirsty but your appetite is chased away
The sun turns us to stone
It's a cloudy day but we still kept hold
Open up that cellar door
Till we seen then we're invisible
No one ever takes the garbage out
And maybe kid gets dared to touch the house
He runs back to announce there's no one home
Cause we paint the foil with the flame
Smear the soda, taste butane
For every fear that can't be named to calm you down
Your heart starts skipping steps
So you're farther gone
And you might expect
If your thoughts should turn to death
Gotta stomp them out like a cigarette

First with your hands and then with your mouth
A downpour of sweat, damp cotton clouds
I was a fool, you were my friend
You made it happen
You took off your clothes, left on the light
You stood there so brave
You used to be shy
Each feature improved, each movement refined and eyes like a showroom
Now they're spreading out the blankets on the beach
That weatherman's a liar
He said it'd be raining
But it's clear and blue as far as I can see

Left by the lamp, right next to the bed
On a cartoon cat pad you scratched with a pen
"Everything is as it's always been
This never happened
Don't take it so bad, it's nothing you did
It's just once something dies you can't make it live
You're a beautiful boy
You're a sweet little kid but I am a woman"
So I laid back down and wrapped myself up in the sheet
And I must have looked like a ghost cause something frightened me
And since then I've been so good at vanishing

Now I do as I please and I lie through my teeth
Someone might get hurt, but it won't be me
I should probably feel cheap but I just feel free
And a little bit empty
No, it isn't so hard to get close to me
There'll be no arguments
We'll always agree
And I will try and be kind when I ask you to leave
We'll both take it easy
But if you stay too long inside my memory
I will trap you in a song tied to a melody
And I will keep you there so you can't bother me

I'm staring out into that vacuum again
From the back porch of my mind
The only thing thats alive, I'm all there is
And I start attacking my vodka
Stab the ice with my straw
My eyes have turned red as stoplights
You seem ready to walk
You know I'll call you eventually
When I wanna talk, until then you're invisible

Cause there's this switch that gets hit
And it all stops making sense
And in the middle of drinks
Maybe the fifth or the sixth
I'm completely alone at a table of friends
I feel nothing for them
I feel nothing, nothing

Well I need a break from the city again
I think I'll ship myself back west
I've got a friend there
She says "Hey anytime"
Unless that offer's expired
I have been less than frequent
She's under no obligation
To indulge every whim
And I'm so ungrateful, I take
She gives and forgives and I keep forgetting it

And each morning she wakes
With a dream to describe
Something lovely that bloomed
In her beautiful mind
I say, "i'll trade you one
For two nightmares of mine
I have some where i die
I have some where we all die"

I'm thinking of quitting drinking again
I know I've said that a couple of times
And I'm always changing my mind
Well I guess I am
But there's this burn in my stomach
And there's this pain in my side
And when I kneel at the toilet
And the morning's clean light
Pours in through the window
Sometimes I pray I don't die
I'm a goddamn hypocrite

But then night rolls around and it all starts making sense
There is no right way or wrong way, you just have to live
And so I do what I do, and at least I exist
What could mean more than this?
What would mean more, mean more?

Some plans were made and rice was thrown
A house was built, a baby born
How time can move both fast and slow amazes me
And so I raise my glass to symmetry
To the second hand and its accuracy
To the actual size of everything
The desert is the sand

You can't hold it in your hand
It won't bow to your demands
There's no difference you can make
There's no difference you can make
And if it seems like an accident
A collage of senselessness
You weren't looking hard enough
I wasn't looking hard enough

An argument for consciousness
The instinct of the blind insect
Who makes love to the flowerbed
And dies in the first freeze
I want to learn such simple things
No politics, no history
So what I want and what I need
Can finally be the same
I just got myself to blame
Give everything up to fate
When there's choices I can make
When there's choices I can make
Now my heart needs a polygraph
I'm so eager to pack my bags
When I really wanna stay

The arc of time, the stench of sex
The innocence you can't protect
Each quarter note, each marble step
Walk up and down that lonely treble clef
Each wanting the next one to arrive

An argument for consciousness
The instinct of the blind insect
Who never thinks not to accept it's fate, that's faith
There's happiness in death
You give to the next one
You give to the next on down the line

The levity of longing that
Distills each dream inside my head
By morning watered down, forget
On silver stars I wish and wish and wish
From one to the next one
From one to the next right down the line
You give to the next one
You give to the next on down the line

A house of cards
The supple heart
Is not a place to dwell

Now you have your cake
Don't hesitate
Come on just do it
Come on just do it

Put it in your mouth
There is only now
Tomorrow has to wait

But know there's no backing out
This is gonna be reality
You can never dream it down

I have no way of telling
The two apart

Well I made amends
In the general sense
But the devil's in the details

And I know the cause
And I want to stop
But I can't do it
I just can't do it

There was love I meant
There were accidents
So tell me which is which

Cause I just can't work it out
But for memory and clarity
We had better write it down

I have no way of knowing
The truth with time dissolves

I put the past into the ground
I saw the future as a cloud
If there's still time to turn around
I'm going to

Its just one day I fell asleep
And now all day and night I dream
I am the first one I deceive
If I can make myself believe
The rest is easy

I wanna be the surgeon that cuts you open
And fixes all of life's mistakes
I wanna be the house that you were raised in
The only place that you feel safe
I wanna be your shower in the morning
That wakes you up and makes you clean
I know I'm just the weather against your window
As you sleep through a winter's dream
Something's churning the earth
Something's stirring the sky
Every color at once in a column of light
Bacteria breeds on a microscope slide
The worm in my heart is the apple of your eye
Don't adore what is impossible
We have built this ship in a wine bottle
If we knew how it worked we would have to grow old
Something's eating at you
Wakes you up in the night
If you're digging the past
Who knows what you'll find
Read the newspaper print off the microfiche slide
And you're holding your breath
For the rest of your life
Don't you love what is intangible
I have built this ship in a wine bottle
But if you knew who I was
You would never grow old

John A Hobson was a good man
He used to loan me books and mic stands
He even got me a subscription to the Socialist Review
Listening to records in his basement
Old folk songs about the government
"It's love of money, not the market," he said
"These fuckers push on you
And freedom yells, it dont cry
Whatever sells will decide
But there is no hell when you die
So dont look so worried"
He got a night life
Lost his day job
Pushing paper, swinging pendulums
Anything to serve a function or to occupy some time
You have got to earn this living somehow
You are good as dead without a bank account
But it is funny how alive he felt, down in that unemployment line
With all the trash at his feet
The pools of piss in the street
All of that filthy empathy for the way we're feeling
The billboards shade
The flags they wave
The anthem was playing loud
The baseball game was letting out
Then all at once he saw the dust
And heard every tiny sound
Got in his truck and turned around
Drove out through the crowd and the cops
Drove out past that center mall
Out past that sickening sprawl
Out past that fenced in gold
And maybe he lost control fucking with the radio
But I bet the stars seemed so close at the end

I wish I had a parachute cause I'm falling bad for you
And I can see the ground approaching now
But I'm not sure what to do
I feel like a pinata won't you take a swing at me
If you could just crack the shell open
I think inside you'd find something sweet

I hear you like a hunter now, your footsteps in the leaves
And I would gladly leave my hiding place
Yes I'm hoping to be seen
So let your arrow fly and sing
I'm well within your aim
Lay your traps for a thousand miles
Please don't let me escape

Winter came to Omaha and left us looking like a bride
A million perfect snowflakes
And no two are alike
And so it's hard for me imagining the flaws in this design
I know debris, it covers everything
But still I am in love with this life

Did it all get real, I guess it's real enough
They got refrigerators full of blood
Another century spent pointing guns
At anything that moves
Sometimes I worry that I've lost the plot
My twitching muscles tense my flippant thoughts
I never really dreamed of heaven much
Until we put him in the ground
But it's all I'm doing now
Listening for patterns in the sound
Of an endless static sea
But once the satellite's deceased
It blows like garbage through the streets
Of the night sky to infinity
But don't you weep
Don't you weep for them
There is nothing as lucky
Honey don't you weep
Don't you weep for them
There is nothing as lucky, as easy, or free

Don't be a criminal in this police state
You better shop and eat and procreate
You got vacation days then you might escape
To a condo on the coast
I set my watch to the atomic clock
I watch the crowd count down till the bomb gets dropped
I always figured there'd be time enough
I never let it get me down
But I can't help it now
Looking for faces in the clouds
I got some friends I barely see
But we're all planning to meet
We'll lay in bags as dead as leaves
All together for eternity
But don't you weep
Don't you weep for us
There is no one as lucky
Honey, don't you weep
Don't you weep for us
There is nothing as lucky, as easy, or free

There's a voice on the phone telling what had happened
Some kind of confusion, more like a disaster
And it wondered how you were left unaffected
But you had no knowledge, no, the chemicals covered you
And so a jury was formed as more liquor was poured
No need for conviction, they're not thirsting for justice
But I slept with the lies I keep inside my head
I found out I was guilty
I found out I was guilty
But I won't be around for the sentencing
'Cause I'm leaving on the next airplane
And though I know that my actions are impossible to justify
They seem adequite to fill up my time
And if I could talk to myself like I was someone else
Then maybe I could take your advice
And I wouldn't act like such an asshole all the time
There's a film on the wall, makes the people look small
Who are sitting beside it, all consumed in the drama
They must return to their lives once the hero has died
They will drive to the office, stopping somewhere for coffee
Where the folk singers, poets, and playwrites convene
Dispensing their wisdom, oh dear amateur orator
They will detail their pain in some standard refrain
They will recite their sadness like it's some kind of contest
Well if it is, I think I am winning it
All beaming with confidence as I make my final lap
The gold medal gleams, so hang it around my neck
Because I am deserving it, the champion of idiots
But a kid carries his Walkman on that long bus ride to Omaha
I know a girl who cries when she practices violin
'Cause each note sounds so pure, it just cuts into her
And then the melody comes pouring out her eyes
Now to me everything else, it just sounds like a lie

I met you through a common friend
In the attic of my parents' house
And though I didn't know it then
I soon was finding out
Oh, you are the roots that sleep beneath my feet
And hold the earth in place
Each time a faucet opens, words are spoken
The water runs away
And I hear your name
No, nothing has changed
There was this book I read and loved, the story of a ship
Who sailed around the world and found that nothing else exists
Beyond his own two sails, and wooden shell
And what is held within
All else is sure to pass, we clutch and grasp
And debate what's truly permanent
But when the wind starts to shift
Well, there's no argument
Now, I sing and drink and sleep on floors
And try hard not to be annoyed
By all these people worrying about me
So when I'm suffering through some awful drive
You occasionally cross my mind
It's my hidden hope that you are still among them
Well are you?
Oh, you are the roots that sleep beneath my feet
And hold the earth in place
Each time a curtain opens, sunlight pours in
A lifetime melts away
And we share a name
On some picturesque grave

Well morning came
And it dressed the sky in a lovely yellow gown
Now the shops they are all opening
In that narrow hallway of downtown
Filled with people who are shopping for their lovers and theirfriends
Saying they won't ever be lonely again
Well, the forest fenced becomes backyards
Like songs are born from sound
And the apple fell and it taught us all
We are chained here to the ground
So, I mean, here we go, but there ain't no escape
These streets are just dead ends
So I won't ever be happy again
Now it seems you, too, see a painful blue
When you stare into the sky
You could never understand
The movement of a hand waving goodbye
But as the story goes, or it is often told
A new day will arise
And all the dance halls will be full of skeletons
That are coming back to life
And on a grassy hill the lion will lay down with the lamb
And I won't ever be lonely again
But until that time I think I'd better find some disbelief to suspend
'Cause I don't want to feel like this again

It was in the March of the winter I turned seventeen
That I bought those pills I thought I would need
And I wrote a letter to my family
Said it's not your fault, you've been good to me
It's just lately I've been feeling like I don't belong
Like the ground's not mine to walk upon
And I've heard that music echo through the house
Where my grandmother drank by herself
And I sat watching a flower as it was withering
I was embarassed by its honesty
So I'd prefer to be remembered as a smiling face
Not this fucking wreck that's taken its place
So please forgive what I have done
No, you can't stay mad at the setting sun
Because we all get tired, I mean eventually
There is nothing left to do but sleep
But spring came bearing sunlight, those persuasive rays
So I gave myself a few more days
My salvation it came, quite suddenly
When Justin spoke very plainly
He said "Now, of course it's your decision
But just so you know
If you decide to leave, soon I will follow"
I wrote this for a baby who has yet to be born
My brother's first child, I hope that womb's not too warm
'Cause it's cold out here, and it will be quite a shock
To breathe this air, to discover loss
So I'd like to make some changes before you arrive
So when your new eyes meet mine, they won't see no lies
Just love, just love
I will be pure, like snow, like gold

Love is real
It is not just in novels or the movies
It is fact
And it is standing here right in front of you
So if you open your eyes, oh what a sweet discovery
There is hope, and there is joy, and there is acceptance
So now let all of the light that collects on your plants
Keep you warm, make you smile
And I will be there with this pen in my hand
To record all the while
You'll be laughing so loud that the house would shake with sound
And everything will be as new as the day it was found
Love is real
It is not just in long distance commercials
Or something that you thought you felt back in high school
So I will turn black and white
Become that horoscope you're reading
It predicts something good is on its way
Oh, and then I will send you the world green and blue
In a box through the mail
You can open it up, hold it right in your hand
And be glad that it's there
And be glad that you're there
You can feel all the knots in your stomach start to untie
And suddenly it's not so hard to say you're all right
Love is real
It is not just in poetry and stories
It is truth, and it will follow you
Everywhere you go from now on
So if you'd just cast off your doubt
Then your lips would answer for you
Oh my darling, when you smile, it is like a song
And I can hear it now

I was cold in a dream, somewhere close to the surface
Between the ice and the stream there is three inches of air
So I swam towards the light
I let my breath get there first
When I opened my eyes I saw myself in the mirror
And I know I would do like my father has done
Yes, we will never break from these chains
You see, your life is gonna course like a history book
Don't be frightened of turning the page
It is all the same
It will always be the same

Sitting around, no work today
Try pacing to keep awake
Laying around, no school today
Just drink until the clock has circled all the way
It's late afternoon as you walk through the rooms
Of a house that is quiet, except for unanswered telephones
You stand near the sink while you're mixing a drink
You think you don't want to pass out
Where your roommates will find you again
Stumble around the neighborhood with nothing to do
You're always looking for something to sniff, smoke, or swallow
Calling over next door to see what they've got
You would settle for anything that would make your brain slow down or stop
Break this circle of thoughts you chase
Before they catch back up with you
Your parents noticied your thinning face
All the weight you lost, all the weight you're losing
You said, "I'm done feeling like a skeleton, no more sleep walking dead"
You're gonna wake from this coma
You're gonna crawl from this bed you have made
And stop counting on that camera that hangs round your neck
Because you will never remember what you choose to forget
As you try to find some source of light
Try to name one thing you like
You used to have such a longer list
And light, you never had to look for it
But now it's so easy, it's so easy to second guess everything you do
Until all you want is to finish this half-empty glass
Before the ice all melts away
This feeling always used to pass
But it seems like it's every day
Seems like it's every night now

Lately I've been wishing I had one desire
Something that would make me never want another
Something that would make it so that nothing matters
All would be clear then
But I guess I'll have to settle for a few brief moments
And watch it all dissolve into a single second
And try to write it down into a perfect sonnet
Or one foolish line
'Cause that's all that you'll get, so you'll have to accept
You are here, then you're gone
But I believe that lovers should be tied together
Thrown into the ocean in the worst of weather
Left there to drown, left there to drown in their innocence
But as for me I'm coming to the final chapter
I read all of the pages and there's still no answer
Only all that was before I know must soon come after
That's the only way it can be
So I stand in the sun, and I breathe with my lungs
I'm trying to spare me the weight of the truth
Saying everything you've ever seen was just a mirror
You've spent your whole life sweating in an endless fever
And laying in a bathtub full of freezing water
Wishing you were a ghost
But once you knew a girl and you named her Lover
Danced with her in kitchens through the greenest summer
Autumn came, she disappeared, you can't remember
Where she said she was going to
But you know that she's gone 'cause she left you a song
That you don't want to sing
We're singing, I believe that lovers should be chained together
Thrown into a fire with their songs and letters
And left there to burn in their arrogance
But as for me I'm coming to my final failure
I've killed myself with changes trying to make things better
Ended up becoming something other than what I had planned to be
All right
I believe that lovers should be draped in flowers
And laid entwined together on a bed of clover
And left there to sleep
Left there to dream of their happiness

There's a car parked where the block begins
And there are people singing praises
Say it's all because of him
And there's a bird perched on a frayed wet wire
And his voice sings out for a lover
But it's covered by the choir
Of voices reaching way beyond the rafters
With devotion they perform these sacred tasks
They cross themselves and offer up their checkbooks
Say that suffering is not too much to ask
Besides, we all are making money
And we're all fucking alone
And we don't know what we're doing
Maybe just buying us some hope
Because we know that we are lonely
Yeah, lonely that's for sure
And the older ones are coughing
Yeah, the older ones are dying
Maybe we're all dying
I pass a graveyard on my way to work
Today I saw two dozen white roses on a fresh new mound of dirt
And I wondered about the occupant
When the darkness finally swallowed him, was he calm and content?
Or was he sweating in a struggle to keep breathing
Ripping apart the sheets that dressed his bed
Crying out loud for someone to help him
And collapsing on his back all pale and dead
Maybe it's me who's this unstable
Always obsessed about the end
Why can't I let what happens happen, and just enjoy the time I spend?
Oh, how I wish it was that easy
But when there is no point to anything
It can get a bit confusing
why it is that I keep going
Why is it that we keep going?

If you could change your days, arranging them in some sweet new sequence
Like any new arrangement's gonna make a difference
Because it's the moment that you're living in and not the one that follows
That makes this mess you're cleaning in your head
And time still drags you forward, though you keep resisting
Because you know it's what you leave behind that you'll soon start missing
And the people you once counted on now say it's all depending
On how you act and how you treat yourself
And that's not very well
So baby, when I call for you
I want you to come and explain yourself to everyone
You nod in an acknowledgement of your frequent mood swings
But what good's an acknowledgement, it still don't change things
We've tried all forms of encouragement, and it's still no better
You just can't seem to fake or force a smile
Not even a little one
So baby, when I call to you I want you to come
And lay it out for everyone
Exactly how it was before any of this happened
And why you can't leave it behind
Don't just sit there when I call to you
I told you to come and lay it out for
Don't feel awkward
Lay it out for everyone

In the morning when you throw up water
And your skin, it turns a pale, pale yellow
Well, every day you lose more color
Do you think that someone paints your mirror?
Do you think that someone paints your mirror?
So you think that things sound different
At the time when you speak
Well, there are visions much clearer than these blurs that you see
And like Neely O'Hara, you swallow your sleep
And wake up in the morning to find out
You are not who you used to be
You don't recognize behavior, or the spelling of your name
And the shape that's in the mirror
Well, you'd swear it's not the same
And like Neely O'Hara, you swallow your sleep
And you really can't remember
But you know you are not, think you are not
No, you are not who you used to be

You turn on a spindle
You're so much looser now, but you're not explaining how
You gained such new repose
I touch the clasp of your locket, with its picture held
Some secret you wouldn't tell
But let it choke your neck
So imagine a darkness, where all shapes divide, solids changing into light
With a burst of heat so bright
Well fine, don't you do what I want you to
Don't degrade yourself the way I do
Because you don't depend on all the shit that I use
To make my moods improve
Near a sea of pianos, there were waves of chords that crashed against the shore
In one huge and pointless roar
And there were girls bringing water, like a dream they came
To cure the fever of my brain and soothe my burning throat
And they made me a necklace, hanging beads of sweat on a string of my regrets
And placed it round my neck, and they were singing,
"Don't you do what you've wanted to
Yeah, don't destroy yourself like those cowards do
And maybe the sun keeps coming up because it has gotten used to you
And your constant need for proof

Here's a scale, weigh it out and you'll find, easily
More than sufficient doubt that these colors you see were picked in advance
By some careful hand with an absolute concept of beauty
They are smeared and these blurs come in random order
And they color the eyes of your former lovers
Hers were green like July, except when she cried they were red
Now, I know a disease that these doctors can't treat
You contract on the day you accept all you see
Is a mirror, and a mirror is all it can be-
A reflection of something we're missing
And language just happened, it was never planned
And it's inadequate to describe where I am
In the room of my house where the light's never been
Waiting for this day to end
And these clocks keep unwinding and completely ignore
Everything that we hate or adore
Once the page of a calendar is turned it's no more
So tell me then, what was it for?
Oh tell me, what was it for?

Does he kiss your eyelids in the morning when you start to raise your head?
And does he sing to you incessantly from the place between your bed and wall?
Does he walk around all day at school with his feet inside your shoes?
Looking down every few steps to pretend he walks with you?
Oh, does he know that place below your neck that is your favorite to be touched?
And does he cry through broken sentences, like 'I love you far too much'?
Does he lay awake listening to your breath?
Worried that you smoke too many cigarettes?
Is he coughing now on a bathroom floor?
For every speck of tile there's a thousand more
You won't ever see, but must hold inside yourself eternally
Well, I drug your ghost across the country and we plotted out my death
In every city, memories would whisper, 'Here is where you rest'
I was determined in Chicago but I dug my teeth into my knees
And I settled for a telephone and sang into your machine
'You are my sunshine, my only sunshine
You are my sunshine, my only sunshine'
And I kissed a girl with a broken jaw that her father gave to her
She had eyes bright enough to burn me, they reminded me of yours
And in a story told she was a little girl in a red-rouge, sun-bruised field
And there were rows of ripe tomatoes where a secret was concealed
And it rose like thunder, clapped under our hands
And it stretched for centuries to a diary entry's end where I wrote,
'You make me happy when skies are gray
You make me happy when skies are gray, and gray, and gray'
Well the clock's heart, it hangs inside its open chest
With hands stretched towards the calendar hanging itself
But I will not weep for those dying days
For all the ones who've left there's a few that've stayed
And they found me here and pulled me from the grass where I was laid

Now and again it seems worse than it is
But mostly the view is accurate
You see your breath in the air as you climb up the stairs
To that coffin you call your apartment
And you sink in the chair, brush the snow from your hair
And drink the cold away
And you're not really sure what you're doing this for
But you need something to fill up the days
A few more hours
There's a dream in my brain that just won't go away
It's been stuck there since it came a few nights ago
I'm standing on a bridge in the town where I lived
As a kid with my mom and my brothers
And then the bridge disappears and I'm standing on air with nothing holding me
And I hang like a star, fucking glow in the dark
For all their starving eyes to see
Like the ones we've wished on, but now I'm confused
Is this death really you?
Do these dreams have any meaning?
No, no, I think it's more like a ghost
That's been following us both
Something vague that we're not seeing
Something more like a feeling

You follow the footsteps, echoes leading down a hall
To a room, there's music playing, tiny bells with moving parts
Here the shadows make things ugly, an effect quite undesirable
And the gold and yellow daylight grows like ivy across the wall
And it bounces off of the painted porcelain, a tiny dancing doll
Her body spins, as she pirouettes again, the world suddenly seems small
On an off-white, subtle morning
You stretch your legs in the front seat
And the road has made a vacuum where our voices used to be
And you lay your head onto my shoulder, pour like water over me
So if I just exist for the next ten minutes of this drive that would be fine
And all these trees that line this curb would be rejoicing and alive
Soon all the joy that pours from everything makes fountains of your eyes
Because you finally understand the movement of a hand
Waving good-bye

The fragile keep secrets, gathered in pockets
And they'll sell them for nothing, a cheap watch or locket
That kind of gold washes off
And the sad act like lepers, they stick to the shadows
They long to ring bells of warning to tell of their coming
So that the pure can shut their doors
And the angry are animals, senseless and savage
They act without order in logical lapses
They stain their mouths with blood
So take my hand, this barren land is alive tonight
Oh, the corn has grown stalks that form a wall too high
But the wind carries sounds that I can't see from beyond that line
Then the stalks begin to sway
Oh, stay with me, Arienette, until the wolves are away
Yeah
The wicked are vultures, and they bake in the canyons
They circle in sunlight and wait for their victims
To collapse and call to them
And the desperate are water, they'll run down forever
As they soak into silence and end up together
In a dark and distant, dark and distant place
So don't leave me here, with only mirrors watching me
This house, it holds nothing but the memories
And the moon, it leaves silver but never sleep
And then the sunlight turns to gray
Oh, stay with me, Arienette, until the wolves are away

Tomorrow when I wake up I'm finding my brother
And I'm making him take me back down to the water
That lake where we sailed and we laughed with our father
I will not desert him, I will not desert him
No matter how I may wish for a coffin so clean
Or these trees to undress all their leaves onto me
I'll put my face in the dirt and then finally I'll see
The sky that has been avoiding me
Well, I started this letter, I'm gonna send it to Ruba
It will be blessed by her eyes on the gulf coast of Florida
With her feet in the sand and one hand on her swimsuit
She'll recite the prayer of my pen
Saying, time take us forward
Relief from this longing
They can land that plane on my heart, I don't care
Just give me November, the warmth of a whisper
In the freezing darkness of my room
But no matter what I would do in attempt to replace
All these pills that I take trying to balance my brain
I see the curious girl with that look on her face
So surprised, she stares out from her display case

The phone slips from a loose grip
Words were missed like some apology
I didn't want to tell you this
No, it's just some guy she's been hanging out with
I don't know, the past couple of weeks I guess
Thank you and hang up the phone
Let the funeral start, hear the casket close
Let's pin split-black ribbon to your overcoat
But laughter pours from under doors
In this house, I don't understand that sound no more
It seems artificial, like a T.V. set
Well, haligh, haligh, haligh, haligh
This weight it must be satisfied
You offer only one reply
You know not what you do
As you tear and tear your hair from roots
From that same head you have twice removed now
A lock of hair you said would prove our love would never die
Well ha ha ha
I remember everything, the words we spoke on freezing South street
And all those morning watching you get ready for school
You combed your hair inside that mirror
The one you painted blue and glued with jewelry tears
Something about those bright colors would always make you feel better
But now we speak with ruined tongues and the words we say aren't meant for anyone
It's just a mumbled sentence to a passing acquaintance
But there was once you
You said you hate my suffering and you understood and you'd take care of me
You'd always be there, well where are you now?
Haligh, haligh, haligh, haligh
The plans were never finalized
But left to hang like yarn and twine dangling before my eyes
As you tear and tear your hair from roots
From that same head you have twice removed now
A lock of hair you said would prove our love would never die
And I sing and sing unlawful things, the pleasure that my sadness brings
As my fingers press onto the strings yet another clumsy chord
Haligh, haligh, an awful lie
This weight would now be satisfied
I'm gonna give you only one reply, I know not who I am
But I talk in the mirror to the stranger that appears
Our conversations are circles, always one-sided, nothing is clear
Except we keep coming back to this meaning that I lack
He says the choices were given and now you must live them
Or just not live, but do you want that?

At the center of the world there's a statue of a girl
She is standing near a well with a bucket bare and dry
I went and looked her in the eyes and she turned me into sand
This clumsy form that I despise, it scattered easy in her hand
And came to rest upon a beach, with a million others there
We sat and waited for the sea to stretch out so that we could disappear
Into the endlessness of blue, into the horror of the truth
See, we are far less than we knew
Yeah, we are far less than we knew
But we knew what we could taste
Girls found honey to drench our hands, the men cut marble to mark our graves
Said, we'll need something to remind us of
All the sweetness that has passed through us
(fresh sangria and lemon tea)
The priest dressed children for choir
(white-robed small voices praise Him)
But found no joy in what was sung
The funeral had begun
In the middle of the day when you drive home to your place
From that job that makes you sleep back to the thoughts that keep you awake
Long after night has come to claim any light that still remains
In the corner of the frame that you put around her face
Two pills just weren't enough
The alarm clock's going off, but you're not waking up
This isn't happening, happening, happening, happening, happening
It is

Sunrise, sunset, sunrise, sunset, swiftly go the days
Sunrise, sunset, you wake up, then you undress, it always is the same
A sunrise and a sunset, you are lying while you confess, keep trying to explain
The sunrise and the sun sets, you realize and then you forget
What you have been trying to retain
But everybody knows that it's all about the things that get stuck inside of your head
Like the songs your roommate sings, a vision of her body as she stretches out on your bed
She raised her hands in the air, asked you
"When was the last time you looked in the mirror?
'Cause you've changed, yeah, you've changed"
Sunrise, sunset, you're hopeful, then you regret, the circle never breaks
With a sunrise and sunset there's a change of heart or address, is there nothing that remains?
For a sunrise or a sunset, you're manic or you're depressed, will you ever feel ok?
For a sunrise and a sunset, your lover is an actress, did you really think she'd stay?
For a sunrise or a sunset, you're either coming or you just left
But you're always on the way
Towards a sunrise or a sunset, a scribble or a sonnet, they are really just the same
To the sunrise or the sunset, the master and his servant have exactly the same fate
It's a sunrise and a sunset, from a cradle to a casket, there is no way to escape
The sunrise and the sunset, hold your sadness like a puppet, keep putting on the play
But everything you do is leading to the point where you just won't know what to do
And at the moment you are laughing, there is someone there who will be laughing louder than you
So it's true, the trick is complete
You've become everything you said you never would be
You're a fool, you're a fool
Sunrise, sunset, sunrise, sunset
The sunrise and the sunset, go home to your apartment
Put the cassette in the tape deck and let that fever play
Sunrise, sunset, where are you, Arienette?
Where are you, Arienette?

Did you expect it all to stop at the wave of your hand?
Like the sun's just gonna drop if it's night you demand
Well, in the dark we are just air so the house might dissolve
But once we're gone, who's gonna care if we were ever here at all?
Well, summer's gonna come, it's gonna cloud our eyes again
There's no need to focus when there's nothing that's worth seeing
So we trade liquor for blood in an attempt to tip the scales
I think you lost what you loved in that mess of details
They seemed so important at the time but now you can't even recall
Any of the names, faces, or lines, it's more the feeling of it all
Well, winter's gonna end, I'm gonna clean these veins again
So close to dying that I finally can start living
All right

There's a middle-aged woman, she's dragging her feet
She carries baskets of clothes to a laundromat
While the Mexican children kick rocks into the street
And they laugh in a language I don't understand
But I love them, why do I love them?
The neighborhood's dimming, I smoke on the porch
And watch the people as they pass enclosed inside their cars
On their faces just anger or disappointment
I start wishing there was something I could offer them
A consolation, what could I offer them?
Well, they are sad in their suburbs
Robots water the lawn, and everything they touch gets dusted spotless
So they start to believe they've not touched anything at all
And the cars in the driveway only multiply
They are lost in their houses, I've heard them sing in the shower
Making speeches to their sister on the telephone, saying, You come home
Woman, you come here, don't stay so far away from me
This weather has me wanting love more tangible
Something I can hold 'cause it's getting cold
Let's hold up our fists to the flame in the sky
To block out the light that's reaching for our eyes
Because it would blind us, it will blind us
Now I've locked my actions in the grooves of routine
So I may never be free of this apathy
But I wait for a letter that's coming to me
She sends me pictures of the ocean in an envelope
So there still is hope, yes, I can be healed
There is someone looking for what I've concealed
In my secret drawer, in my pockets deep
You will find the reasons that I can't sleep and you will still want me
But will you still want me?
Come for the week, you can sleep in my bed
And pass through my life like a dream through my head
It will be easy, I'll make it easy
All I have for the moment is a song to pass the time
And a melody to keep me from worrying
Some simple progression to keep my fingers busy
And words that are sure to come back to me, and they will be laughing
My mediocrity, my mediocrity

Radio: Hi, we're back. This is Radio KX and we're here with Conor Oberst of the band Bright Eyes. How are you doing Conor?

Conor: Fine, thanks. Just a little wet

Radio: Oh yeah, it's still coming down out there

Conor: Yeah, I sort of had to run from the car

Radio: Well, we are glad you made it. Now your new album, Fevers and Mirrors. Tell us a little bit about the title. I noticed there was a good deal of repeated imagery in the lyrics, fevers . . . mirrors, scales, clocks. Could you discuss some of this?

Conor: Sure. Let's see, the fever is . . .

Radio: First let me say, that this is a brilliant record, man, we're all really into it here at the station. We get lots of calls, it's really good stuff

Conor: Thanks, thanks a lot

Radio: So talk a little bit about some of the symbolism

Conor: The fever?

Radio: Sure

Conor: Well the fever is basically whatever ails you or oppresses you, it could be anything. In my case it's my neurosis, my depression, but I don't want to be limited to that. It's certainly different for different people. It's whatever keeps you up at night

Radio: I see

Conor: And then the mirror is like, as you might have guessed, self-examination or reflection or whatever form. This could be vanity or self-loathing. I don't know, I'm guilty of both

Radio: That's interesting. How about the scale?

Conor: The scale is essentially our attempt to solve our problems quantitatively through logic or rationalization. In my opinion it's often fruitless, but always, well, not always. And the clocks and calendars, etcetera, its just time, our little measurements. It's like, it's always chasing after us

Radio: It is, it is. How about this Arienette, how does she fit in to all of this?

Conor: I'd prefer not talk about it, in case she's listening

Radio: Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't realize she was a real person

Conor: She's not, but I made her up

Radio: Oh, so she's not real?

Conor: Just as real as you or I

Radio: I don't think I understand

Conor: Neither do I, but after I grow up I will. I mean, you know what, a lot of things are really unclear for me right now

Radio: That's interesting. Now you mentioned your depression

Conor: No I didn't

Radio: You're from Nebraska, right?

Conor: Yeah, that's right

Radio: Now let me know if I'm getting to personal, but there seems to be a pretty dark past back there somewhere. What was it like for you growing up?

Conor: Dark? Not really. Actually I had a great childhood. My parents were wonderful. I went to a Catholic school. They have, I had money, so it was all easy. I basically had everything that I wanted anytime

Radio: Really? So some of the references like babies in bathtubs are not biographical?

Conor: Well I did have a brother who died in a bathtub . . . he drowned. Well actually I had five brothers that drowned

Radio: (Chuckle)

Conor: No, I'm serious. My mother drowned one every year for five consecutive years. They were all named Padraic, and that's why they only got one song. It's kind of like walking out a door and discovering that it's a window

Radio: But your music is certainly very personal

Conor: Of course, I put a lot of myself into what I do. It's like being an author, you have to free yourself to use symbolism and allegory to meet your goal. And part of that is compassion, empathy for other people and their situations. Some of what I sing about comes from other people's experiences. It shouldn't matter, the message is intended to be universal

Radio: I see what you mean

Conor: Could you make that sound stop, please?

Radio: Yes. And your goal?

Conor: I don't know. Create feelings I guess. A song never ends up the way you planned it

Radio: That's funny you'd say that, do you think that . . .

Conor: Do you ever hear things that aren't really there?

Radio: I'm sorry, what?

Conor: Never mind. How long have you worked at this station?

Radio: Oh, just a few minutes. Now you mentioned empathy for others. Would you say that that motivates you to make the music that you make?

Conor: No, not really. It's more a need for sympathy. I want people to feel sorry for me. I like to feel the burn of the audience's eyes on me when I'm revealing all my darkest secrets into the microphone. When I was a kid I used to carry a safety pin around with me every where I went in my pocket, and when people weren't paying enough attention to me, I'd dig it into my arm until I started crying. Everyone would stop what they were doing and ask me what was the matter. I guess, I guess I kind of liked that

Radio: Really, you're telling me that you're doing all of this for attention?

Conor: No, I hate it when people look at me, I get nauseous. In fact, I could care less what people think about me. Do you feel that?

Radio: No, I feel sick

Conor: I really just want to be this warm yellow light that pours over everyone that I love

Radio: So you're going to play something for us now? Is this a new song?

Conor: Yeah, but I haven't written it yet. It's one I've been meaning to write called A Song To Pass The Time

Radio: Oh, that's a nice title

Conor: You should write your own scripts

Radio: Yeah, I know

This is the first day of my life
I swear I was born right in the doorway
I went out in the rain, suddenly everything changed
They're spreading blankets on the beach

Yours is the first face that I saw
I think I was blind before I met you
Now I don't know where I am
I don't know where I've been
But I know where I want to go

And so I thought I'd let you know
That these things take forever
I especially am slow
But I realize that I need you
And I wondered if I could come home

Remember the time you drove all night
Just to meet me in the morning
And I thought it was strange you said everything changed
You felt as if you had just woke up
And you said "this is the first day of my life
"I'm glad I didn't die before I met you
"Now I don't care I could go anywhere with you
"And I'd probably be happy"

So if you want to be with me
With these things there's no telling
We'll just have to wait and see
But I'd rather be working for a paycheck
Then waiting to win the lottery
Besides maybe this time it's different
I mean I really think you'll like me

When the president talks to God
Are the conversations brief or long?
Does he ask to rape our womens' rights
And send poor farm kids off to die?
Does God suggest an oil hike
When the president talks to God?

When the president talks to God
Are the consonants all hard or soft?
Is he resolute all down the line?
Is every issue black or white?
Does what God say ever change his mind
When the president talks to God?

When the president talks to God
Does he fake that drawl or merely nod?
Agree which convicts should be killed?
Where prisons should be built and filled?
Which voter fraud must be concealed
When the president talks to God?

When the president talks to God
I wonder which one plays the better cop
We should find some jobs, the ghetto's broke
No, they're lazy, George, I say we don't
Just give 'em more liquor stores and dirty coke
That's what God recommends

When the president talks to God
Do they drink near beer and go play golf
While they pick which countries to invade
Which Muslim souls still can be saved?
I guess God just calls a spade a spade
When the president talks to God

When the president talks to God
Does he ever think that maybe he's not?
That that voice is just inside his head
When he kneels next to the presidential bed
Does he ever smell his own bullshit
When the president talks to God?

I doubt it
I doubt it

I am a blueblood I will admit that
I dance in blue shoes and wear a blue hat
Live in a blue house on a blue street, in a blue town by a blue creek
I write my blue songs with my blue pen
I sing the blue notes to my blue friends
Now I don't know that much about you
But I like you because you are true blue
I had a blue dream about a blue star
In it I drove there in my blue car
And when I got there I met a blue dog with a blue tongue
We had real fun
We bounced a blue ball
It broke a blue glass
We banged on blue drums and called it bluegrass
I guess the thing I'm trying to tell you is that it is best, kid
If you're true blue
Once I had gangrene I had it real bad
And so the Doc came with his black bag
I said "You know doc, I don't feel well
"If you had a blue bag, I think I'd get well"
So he came right back with a blue sack
He said, "Will this do?" I said, "Why not? Yeah"
That is how I am here today to tell you that it is best, man
To be true blue
Out on the blue sea I sailed a blue ship
I had a first mate that always had blue lips
His name was Bluebeard
He had a weird twitch
We flew a blue flag up on a big stick
And we ate bluegill and we ate blue chips
Oh, I felt real blue eating that blue fish
Because there ain't much that I won't do
Unless it keeps me from being true blue
Once in a blue moon there is a blue sky
I wear my blue jeans and fly my blue kite
It hangs like a bluebird until the wind dies
And then the tears pour out of my blue eyes
If it is your birthday we'll bake you a blue cake
And then we'll eat it off my blue plates
Because kid, I don't know much about you
But I like you because you are true blue