House, with Fire, Burning- Lyrics
When I wrote Tightrope I thought it was clear who was right in this story. But as time went onI saw that my perpsective (as the advice giver) was flawed, that you can never tell what the payoff is when you witness someone in the throes of something that seems so obviously painful. I suppose its a prime example of how most people value unsolicited advice...NOT!
TIGHTROPE
You're walking a tightrope and you're
Telling me you like the view
Jump off on the side that
She wants that night
And when she's tired of you
You don't even wait for the shoe
Crawl back in the bottle
You're a genie, that's right
CHORUS
You say I'm crazy
That you
Don't really love her
But you're
So sentimental that you thought
She was calling you
Calling you
You say she's an angel and she
Moves through the clouds, so gently
I say she's a devil
She won't share her soul
You think I don't recognize her
That I've always been a compromiser
You think I should let her
Just take her toll
CHORUS
BRIDGE
You're asking me
Won't you stand by a friend?
Don't you know?
Don't you know?
That I've been right by your side
Right by your side
As you're falling
You say you're getting better
And that you're gonna let her
Keep you
On a tight rope
Her tightrope
Told you time and time before
It's time you finally closed that door
You say it's the nearest
To heaven you've been
You say you're not a pawn at heart
You're never gonna play that part, but
This is the longest encore I've seen
________________________
The Return of John Slate is a dark homecoming. After I wrote it I realized it was very close in feeling tone to the novel "Cold Mountain". There is a bleakness of imagery here, forged by a sense of resignation. John Slate is someone who's been battered, who just wants some sort of warmth and closeness, who feels hopeless, but still is compelled to continue the journey home.
THE RETURN OF JOHN SLATE
Shadows long
The sun is sinkin
And I been this way before
I can't say when
I've been wrong
But I'm thinkin
That this is like the road
That takes me home again
CHORUS
So know I'm wondering what it is
That keeps me moving homeward
And I'm thinkin the road I've taken
Ain't so new
What if all of my wandering and traveling
are for nothing
I ask myself
What can I do?
Fields are brown
Birds ain't singin
I was hopin I would find my way
Before the snow
What's on my back
Is all I'm bringin
I was carrying a load
It made me move too slow
CHORUS
Sun comes up
And I ain't countin
Just how many nights I slept
Out in the cold
I've come back
From over the mountains
Seems the longest time
I had a hand to hold
CHORUS
__________________
Lately I seem to be having fun with fictional characters. I FELL DOWN was a fun stretch of an idea (well, fun because it wasn't me born on a bus!) This one had an irresistable energy when I wrote it; one of those songs that pops out fully formed.
I FELL DOWN
I was born while movin on
In the back of a Greyhound
Headed off to the west
My momma sang her favorite song
About a man who'd been unfaithful
And the girl that he left
My daddy,
He was untrue
He broke her
Sweet heart in two
I grew up in a parking lot
In a town that counted nothing
Except for when my momma'd sleep
I made my coin I saved it well
And as soon as I was able
No apron strings could keep
My momma,
She was so true
I closed my heart tight
Till I met you
CHORUS
Well there ain't no doubt about it
I fell down for you
Honey you can scream or shout it
But it would not be more true
So I never could stay tied too long
I played my cards very careful
I'd keep 'em close to the vest
And when I found love comin strong
I made my head do the talkin'
And let my feet do the rest
I made some
Sweethearts turn blue
But that's all done
Since I met you
CHORUS
________________________
Hard Song is strictly autobiographical. It's about running into a wall around my ability to create art.
HARD SONG
Well it's hard to tell anymore
What comes next
What comes after
All this world I had formed
Just comes unplanted
Spinnin' off its orbit
I don't know nothin anymore
Don't know where to go
I left a child in the house
With fire burning
I met my shadow in the dark
But it's just not my type
Don't think the matter is fine
The thought keeps turning
CHORUS
It's the hard song
The hardest song to sing for you
It's got those hard chords
I strum but never play them through
Seems before I never would fall
Kept my balance
Even after all my
Foolish dreams hit the wall
But now it's clearer to me now
That thing have changed
I'm looking up there from the ground
The view here ain't fine
Don't think the state that I'm in's
The least amusin'
The miles tick by then I'm alone
On the dark side of the road
If you would offer a ride
I won't refuse it
CHORUS
____________________
DOESN'T HURT
Doesn't hurt no more
I finally made it through
I found the other shore
I think you found it too.
Is there something we should keep?
Are there things that we should say?
There's things that make me weep
But not enough to stay
CHORUS
Do you remember that night
We said that our love was an ocean?
And we'd move through the dark
Steer by the light from the bay
But it's clear to us now
Our love became sadness in motion
And we sailed til the edge of night
recalled the day
Doesn't hurt no more
I finally made it through
On the other shore
I watch you fade from view.
_______________________
This is Worse is another take on the Hard Song theme of struggles. The "bauble" is the shiny idea of success and recognition. I wrote this with a picking part for the guitar, but it just was so forlorn and self pitying! Somehow, while recording, it came clear that a hard driving strum pattern was needed, giving some energetic relief. It saved the song for me.
THIS IS WORSE
Thinking of my fortunes
And the troubles they don't end
Just how I let my song go
I can't comprehend
CHORUS
But this is worse than starting over
From a love that dies too soon
And the fullness of her body
The scent of her perfume
Leave you longing for love
In the dead of the night
You fly in the dark like a moth to the light
You can't hold a candle
You pass right through the flame
You count on your friends
to remember your name
I don't know what comes to greet me
On the other side of truth
What's not working any longer
Are the apologies of youth
Well you pawned your life for a bauble
On the bottom of the sea
Shining like a marble
A bitter pill for me
CHORUS
I don't trust this feeling
I don't like this trend
All these cracks in the ceiling
I keep trying to mend
____________________________
Past the Centerline is about finding new love at a time when you least expect it. The *"angels on a pinhead" are about the miracle and healing power of love... grace coming round for another turn.
*From the catechistic koan: how many angels can fit on the head of a pin? The answer? As many as you can imagine, and more.
Past the Centerline
Well I think about it often and I wonder
Did you fall in love for him or just for you?
Did a baby and a mortgage pull you under?
Did your dreams of higher calling go there too?
CHORUS
Just when it seems we're lost and gone forever,
We find a way to back strong and new
So it's not strange to find ourselves together
Babe I've gone past the centerline with you.
Gone past the centerline
Gone past the centerline with you.
I once thought the love I had would be the only
One I need to trace the life upon my hands
But we never thought our love
would be so lonely
That letting go would help us start to understand
CHORUS
I've heard it said that love likes second chances
A chance to earn a deeper meaning
from what's lost
Like the angels on a pinhead
it comes dancin'
To help us finally find
our grief is worth the cost
______________________________
I actually don't know anyone this hard bitten about love, but once the images in the chorus started coming I had to finish it. I kept telling Heidi I was sure that the chorus was something written by someone else that I had coopted as my own. I felt it was too beautiful an image and melody to be my own.
DON'T LEAVE YOUR BABY CRYING
We met last, in December
When you came in from the snow
You asked if I remembered
This girl you know
Though you talked all night about her
It seems you hadn't changed a bit
Cause when you stay a moving target
You're hard to hit
CHORUS
And I said
Don't let the night fall
Don't leave your baby crying
On the silent road
And though you might call
She knows you will be flying
Where her heart can't go
Don't leave her stranded in your heart
(I'm telling you)
She's had to battle from the start
(I'm telling you)
Love is a science not an art
CHORUS-bridge
Earth it spins
Planets go
Fire and heat
Ice and snow
You're an empty street
With a sign that glows
You love her
Let her know!
We talked about the reason
You liked living on your own
You made a joke that I was moss
Gathering stone
As we spoke you seemed to soften
But suddenly you had to leave
We made a pledge we'd meet more often
That neither believed
CHORUS
____________________
Dark Night is mostly fiction, but everyone can haul up the painful memory of unrequited love! For some reason, I could hear Richard Thompson singing this song while I wrote it. The whole song for me revolves around the phrase and chords in "If I knew, how I could sink so low". That is the point when you realize things aren't going to get better. It's a point of mobilization.
DARK NIGHT
Left my heart on the table
Too late to turn back
I said I'm willing and able
And you told me all the things I lack
If I could swear on the bible
If I could say for sure
I'd doubt my own survival
And I'd say that there is no cure
CHORUS
But I've tried
I failed
Crown of thorns,
Bed of nails
And if I knew
How I could sink so low
Everything about you
Would've been a sign to show
Show me what was coming
Dark night, the stars are falling
Like I've never seen before
I tried to keep from crawling
But I always end up at your door
At your door
You said I probably should thank you
You only took what I gave
But you waited till our love sank me
And there's nothing left to be saved
If I could plan on a future
Never count on my past
There's still no way I could suit you
And I'd still be tied to the mast
_____________________
Daedalus is about me, about the temptation to give up on long-held dreams, and the ultimate joy/terror of flying off on an ill-conceived fancy anyway. You really know better, but for want of options...there you go! So, Daedalus ends up just like Icarus, flying into the sun, even though he's older, supposedly wiser.
DAEDELUS
As a younger man I'd
Seek grail and windmills
But somewhere the love died
Maybe I had my fill
Oh…..I had my fill
Now that I'm older
Say I'm done with choosing
It's a tap on a shoulder
Reminds me I'm losing
Oh…..As if I didn't know!
CHORUS
I walked the streets
I donned a shroud
Felt I should die
I hoped that crowds
Would come
To watch my final flight…final flight
If I head for the bright light
I'll miss the darkness
It's a habit I can't fight
Serving up this mess
Oh…To the sun I'll go.
CHORUS II
I'll raise the roof
I'll climb the clouds
I'll sail the sky
The crowds will come to cheer me on
I'll fly so high
I'm not really trying
To ignore the facts…still
If my dreams aren't flying
These wings of wax will
Oh…To the sun I'll go.
CHORUS II
I'll raise the roof
I'll climb the clouds
I'll sail the sky
The crowds will come to cheer me on
I'll fly so high
_____________________
Louzie is "loosely" based on an old girl friend. I think most of the "difficult" women in my songs are about her!! I wonder if she'd recognize herself?
LOUZIE-MAY SLAUGHTER
This is a tale about a gal named Louzie
Long dark and tan
She makes me kinda woozie
She never fails
To remind me what she needs in a man
She acts like a judge
Preys like an eagle
Eye like a knife
Decides what is legal
She holds a grudge
While I'm just holding on for my life
She, she keeps saying
I, I'm not playing fair
But I don't care no more
CHORUS
In spite of the truth
I keep walking,
Keep on talking
In light of the hurtful things she said
With a bite of the fruit I left the garden
Beggin' her pardon
In spite of the self I left for dead
Now I'm not saying
I ain't gonna miss her
But she draws blood
Every time that I kiss her
She's a thorny rose
That I just gotta nip in the bud.
All I understand
Of me an Louzie Slaughter
Is pity on the man
Who has her for a daughter
She's kinda like the flu
It seems I've gone and caught her again
CHORUS
________________________
Heidi and I witnessed an awful scene involving an accident with a cat. Somehow in Hit and Run, those images got tranferred into a relationship. This one goes past personal experience in relationship to some dark place of pain and betrayal I would wish on no one.
HIT AND RUN
I never could get far past the measure
Of what's been soothing you when you go away
And all the flashing of the heat in your pleasure
Is just a thing you say I put in the way.
You say that you will never be leavin'
That you will always be a part of the plan
But then you go off like a cat in the evening
And then you stray back when you want me again
CHORUS
One of my lives
One of my hurts
It's one of my hearts
Lying stranded in the dirt
I'm writhing in the air
Trying to make it to the earth
You laugh when I ask your devotion
You say a back has to break to be strong
You think a rat has no sense of the notion
That a trap's no good place to stay long
CHORUS
It's a dangerous thing that in your mind
I know you think you're having your fun
But someone ends up chalked in an outline
When you play your hit and run
CHORUS
______________________
Cell Phone Jesus is about loss of faith...and perhaps about regaining it as well (the jury, after all, is still out). It started out a lot darker...so dark I didn't think it would be a song I'd ever sing in public. But then this sort of lighter counterpoint came into the song to relive the bitterness I was feeling.The bridge makes Old Testament references while the chorus remains unrelentingly cheery. Interesting that the song is so reflective of how things were working for me...that doubt and anger couldn't hold down hope for salvation.
CELL PHONE JESUS
Got a call today from Jesus
As I was walking down the street
A stranger waved me to his cell phone
He said "Phil? It's Jesus
He'd like to speak"
Well we hadn't talked in a very long time
And I could not recall his face.
He finally said
"How' bout them Red Sox"?
And I said "Yeah,
But who's in first place?"
CHORUS
And he said
"Oh, when the dark side
Starts calling
Oh, let me know
Oh, when the dark side
Starts calling,
Call me up I'll be home."
Well I told him I wasn't in the habit
Of making long-distance phone calls
And I really hate ringing up
A bunch of debt.
There was a very long pause
At the other end of the line
He said "Phil
You can call collect!"
BRIDGE
I lit the fire in the morning
Let the scapegoats run away.
No sacrificing all the children,
Still a house, burned today
CHORUS
Now I wasn't sure if he was
Talking about some satanic telemarketers,
Or whether he meant the BIG "D" from hell
But really, when you stop and think about it
These days,
It's kinda hard to tell!
BRIDGE
CHORUS
Got a call today from Jesus
I swear it's true as I have told.
Well except maybe
The part about call waiting
He never put me on hold!
CHORUS
____________________
I love writing a blues song with with a "Done me Wrong" theme (again, with the archtypal nasty girlfriend) Somehow I usually gravitate to a bit of wry humor, but this one seemed to resist any levity.
SOUTHBOUND TRAIN
I was goin' down to the station
I was travelin' by myself
I saw you there at the platform
But you were kissin' someone else.
The though, to me,
Came kinda slowly,
I know now that it was true
That you punched my ticket
An you'll punch his too.
CHORUS
It seems I'm goin' nowhere
On a funky southbound train
I told you I was leavin' cause the streets
Don't look the same.
I'll just pack all my bags up and get now
No cause to remain
That's how it ended up
I met the blues on a southbound train
I met the blues on a southbound train
I met the blues for your love.
I told myself I was lucky
I told myself we were through
And on this train headed for disaster
You were boarding too
I turned and walked away slowly
It seems that you just couldn't see
That a kiss you meant to hurt me
Set me free.
CHORUS
TIGHTROPE
You're walking a tightrope and you're
Telling me you like the view
Jump off on the side that
She wants that night
And when she's tired of you
You don't even wait for the shoe
Crawl back in the bottle
You're a genie, that's right
CHORUS
You say I'm crazy
That you
Don't really love her
But you're
So sentimental that you thought
She was calling you
Calling you
You say she's an angel and she
Moves through the clouds, so gently
I say she's a devil
She won't share her soul
You think I don't recognize her
That I've always been a compromiser
You think I should let her
Just take her toll
CHORUS
BRIDGE
You're asking me
Won't you stand by a friend?
Don't you know?
Don't you know?
That I've been right by your side
Right by your side
As you're falling
You say you're getting better
And that you're gonna let her
Keep you
On a tight rope
Her tightrope
Told you time and time before
It's time you finally closed that door
You say it's the nearest
To heaven you've been
You say you're not a pawn at heart
You're never gonna play that part, but
This is the longest encore I've seen
________________________
The Return of John Slate is a dark homecoming. After I wrote it I realized it was very close in feeling tone to the novel "Cold Mountain". There is a bleakness of imagery here, forged by a sense of resignation. John Slate is someone who's been battered, who just wants some sort of warmth and closeness, who feels hopeless, but still is compelled to continue the journey home.
THE RETURN OF JOHN SLATE
Shadows long
The sun is sinkin
And I been this way before
I can't say when
I've been wrong
But I'm thinkin
That this is like the road
That takes me home again
CHORUS
So know I'm wondering what it is
That keeps me moving homeward
And I'm thinkin the road I've taken
Ain't so new
What if all of my wandering and traveling
are for nothing
I ask myself
What can I do?
Fields are brown
Birds ain't singin
I was hopin I would find my way
Before the snow
What's on my back
Is all I'm bringin
I was carrying a load
It made me move too slow
CHORUS
Sun comes up
And I ain't countin
Just how many nights I slept
Out in the cold
I've come back
From over the mountains
Seems the longest time
I had a hand to hold
CHORUS
__________________
Lately I seem to be having fun with fictional characters. I FELL DOWN was a fun stretch of an idea (well, fun because it wasn't me born on a bus!) This one had an irresistable energy when I wrote it; one of those songs that pops out fully formed.
I FELL DOWN
I was born while movin on
In the back of a Greyhound
Headed off to the west
My momma sang her favorite song
About a man who'd been unfaithful
And the girl that he left
My daddy,
He was untrue
He broke her
Sweet heart in two
I grew up in a parking lot
In a town that counted nothing
Except for when my momma'd sleep
I made my coin I saved it well
And as soon as I was able
No apron strings could keep
My momma,
She was so true
I closed my heart tight
Till I met you
CHORUS
Well there ain't no doubt about it
I fell down for you
Honey you can scream or shout it
But it would not be more true
So I never could stay tied too long
I played my cards very careful
I'd keep 'em close to the vest
And when I found love comin strong
I made my head do the talkin'
And let my feet do the rest
I made some
Sweethearts turn blue
But that's all done
Since I met you
CHORUS
________________________
Hard Song is strictly autobiographical. It's about running into a wall around my ability to create art.
HARD SONG
Well it's hard to tell anymore
What comes next
What comes after
All this world I had formed
Just comes unplanted
Spinnin' off its orbit
I don't know nothin anymore
Don't know where to go
I left a child in the house
With fire burning
I met my shadow in the dark
But it's just not my type
Don't think the matter is fine
The thought keeps turning
CHORUS
It's the hard song
The hardest song to sing for you
It's got those hard chords
I strum but never play them through
Seems before I never would fall
Kept my balance
Even after all my
Foolish dreams hit the wall
But now it's clearer to me now
That thing have changed
I'm looking up there from the ground
The view here ain't fine
Don't think the state that I'm in's
The least amusin'
The miles tick by then I'm alone
On the dark side of the road
If you would offer a ride
I won't refuse it
CHORUS
____________________
DOESN'T HURT
Doesn't hurt no more
I finally made it through
I found the other shore
I think you found it too.
Is there something we should keep?
Are there things that we should say?
There's things that make me weep
But not enough to stay
CHORUS
Do you remember that night
We said that our love was an ocean?
And we'd move through the dark
Steer by the light from the bay
But it's clear to us now
Our love became sadness in motion
And we sailed til the edge of night
recalled the day
Doesn't hurt no more
I finally made it through
On the other shore
I watch you fade from view.
_______________________
This is Worse is another take on the Hard Song theme of struggles. The "bauble" is the shiny idea of success and recognition. I wrote this with a picking part for the guitar, but it just was so forlorn and self pitying! Somehow, while recording, it came clear that a hard driving strum pattern was needed, giving some energetic relief. It saved the song for me.
THIS IS WORSE
Thinking of my fortunes
And the troubles they don't end
Just how I let my song go
I can't comprehend
CHORUS
But this is worse than starting over
From a love that dies too soon
And the fullness of her body
The scent of her perfume
Leave you longing for love
In the dead of the night
You fly in the dark like a moth to the light
You can't hold a candle
You pass right through the flame
You count on your friends
to remember your name
I don't know what comes to greet me
On the other side of truth
What's not working any longer
Are the apologies of youth
Well you pawned your life for a bauble
On the bottom of the sea
Shining like a marble
A bitter pill for me
CHORUS
I don't trust this feeling
I don't like this trend
All these cracks in the ceiling
I keep trying to mend
____________________________
Past the Centerline is about finding new love at a time when you least expect it. The *"angels on a pinhead" are about the miracle and healing power of love... grace coming round for another turn.
*From the catechistic koan: how many angels can fit on the head of a pin? The answer? As many as you can imagine, and more.
Past the Centerline
Well I think about it often and I wonder
Did you fall in love for him or just for you?
Did a baby and a mortgage pull you under?
Did your dreams of higher calling go there too?
CHORUS
Just when it seems we're lost and gone forever,
We find a way to back strong and new
So it's not strange to find ourselves together
Babe I've gone past the centerline with you.
Gone past the centerline
Gone past the centerline with you.
I once thought the love I had would be the only
One I need to trace the life upon my hands
But we never thought our love
would be so lonely
That letting go would help us start to understand
CHORUS
I've heard it said that love likes second chances
A chance to earn a deeper meaning
from what's lost
Like the angels on a pinhead
it comes dancin'
To help us finally find
our grief is worth the cost
______________________________
I actually don't know anyone this hard bitten about love, but once the images in the chorus started coming I had to finish it. I kept telling Heidi I was sure that the chorus was something written by someone else that I had coopted as my own. I felt it was too beautiful an image and melody to be my own.
DON'T LEAVE YOUR BABY CRYING
We met last, in December
When you came in from the snow
You asked if I remembered
This girl you know
Though you talked all night about her
It seems you hadn't changed a bit
Cause when you stay a moving target
You're hard to hit
CHORUS
And I said
Don't let the night fall
Don't leave your baby crying
On the silent road
And though you might call
She knows you will be flying
Where her heart can't go
Don't leave her stranded in your heart
(I'm telling you)
She's had to battle from the start
(I'm telling you)
Love is a science not an art
CHORUS-bridge
Earth it spins
Planets go
Fire and heat
Ice and snow
You're an empty street
With a sign that glows
You love her
Let her know!
We talked about the reason
You liked living on your own
You made a joke that I was moss
Gathering stone
As we spoke you seemed to soften
But suddenly you had to leave
We made a pledge we'd meet more often
That neither believed
CHORUS
____________________
Dark Night is mostly fiction, but everyone can haul up the painful memory of unrequited love! For some reason, I could hear Richard Thompson singing this song while I wrote it. The whole song for me revolves around the phrase and chords in "If I knew, how I could sink so low". That is the point when you realize things aren't going to get better. It's a point of mobilization.
DARK NIGHT
Left my heart on the table
Too late to turn back
I said I'm willing and able
And you told me all the things I lack
If I could swear on the bible
If I could say for sure
I'd doubt my own survival
And I'd say that there is no cure
CHORUS
But I've tried
I failed
Crown of thorns,
Bed of nails
And if I knew
How I could sink so low
Everything about you
Would've been a sign to show
Show me what was coming
Dark night, the stars are falling
Like I've never seen before
I tried to keep from crawling
But I always end up at your door
At your door
You said I probably should thank you
You only took what I gave
But you waited till our love sank me
And there's nothing left to be saved
If I could plan on a future
Never count on my past
There's still no way I could suit you
And I'd still be tied to the mast
_____________________
Daedalus is about me, about the temptation to give up on long-held dreams, and the ultimate joy/terror of flying off on an ill-conceived fancy anyway. You really know better, but for want of options...there you go! So, Daedalus ends up just like Icarus, flying into the sun, even though he's older, supposedly wiser.
DAEDELUS
As a younger man I'd
Seek grail and windmills
But somewhere the love died
Maybe I had my fill
Oh…..I had my fill
Now that I'm older
Say I'm done with choosing
It's a tap on a shoulder
Reminds me I'm losing
Oh…..As if I didn't know!
CHORUS
I walked the streets
I donned a shroud
Felt I should die
I hoped that crowds
Would come
To watch my final flight…final flight
If I head for the bright light
I'll miss the darkness
It's a habit I can't fight
Serving up this mess
Oh…To the sun I'll go.
CHORUS II
I'll raise the roof
I'll climb the clouds
I'll sail the sky
The crowds will come to cheer me on
I'll fly so high
I'm not really trying
To ignore the facts…still
If my dreams aren't flying
These wings of wax will
Oh…To the sun I'll go.
CHORUS II
I'll raise the roof
I'll climb the clouds
I'll sail the sky
The crowds will come to cheer me on
I'll fly so high
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Louzie is "loosely" based on an old girl friend. I think most of the "difficult" women in my songs are about her!! I wonder if she'd recognize herself?
LOUZIE-MAY SLAUGHTER
This is a tale about a gal named Louzie
Long dark and tan
She makes me kinda woozie
She never fails
To remind me what she needs in a man
She acts like a judge
Preys like an eagle
Eye like a knife
Decides what is legal
She holds a grudge
While I'm just holding on for my life
She, she keeps saying
I, I'm not playing fair
But I don't care no more
CHORUS
In spite of the truth
I keep walking,
Keep on talking
In light of the hurtful things she said
With a bite of the fruit I left the garden
Beggin' her pardon
In spite of the self I left for dead
Now I'm not saying
I ain't gonna miss her
But she draws blood
Every time that I kiss her
She's a thorny rose
That I just gotta nip in the bud.
All I understand
Of me an Louzie Slaughter
Is pity on the man
Who has her for a daughter
She's kinda like the flu
It seems I've gone and caught her again
CHORUS
________________________
Heidi and I witnessed an awful scene involving an accident with a cat. Somehow in Hit and Run, those images got tranferred into a relationship. This one goes past personal experience in relationship to some dark place of pain and betrayal I would wish on no one.
HIT AND RUN
I never could get far past the measure
Of what's been soothing you when you go away
And all the flashing of the heat in your pleasure
Is just a thing you say I put in the way.
You say that you will never be leavin'
That you will always be a part of the plan
But then you go off like a cat in the evening
And then you stray back when you want me again
CHORUS
One of my lives
One of my hurts
It's one of my hearts
Lying stranded in the dirt
I'm writhing in the air
Trying to make it to the earth
You laugh when I ask your devotion
You say a back has to break to be strong
You think a rat has no sense of the notion
That a trap's no good place to stay long
CHORUS
It's a dangerous thing that in your mind
I know you think you're having your fun
But someone ends up chalked in an outline
When you play your hit and run
CHORUS
______________________
Cell Phone Jesus is about loss of faith...and perhaps about regaining it as well (the jury, after all, is still out). It started out a lot darker...so dark I didn't think it would be a song I'd ever sing in public. But then this sort of lighter counterpoint came into the song to relive the bitterness I was feeling.The bridge makes Old Testament references while the chorus remains unrelentingly cheery. Interesting that the song is so reflective of how things were working for me...that doubt and anger couldn't hold down hope for salvation.
CELL PHONE JESUS
Got a call today from Jesus
As I was walking down the street
A stranger waved me to his cell phone
He said "Phil? It's Jesus
He'd like to speak"
Well we hadn't talked in a very long time
And I could not recall his face.
He finally said
"How' bout them Red Sox"?
And I said "Yeah,
But who's in first place?"
CHORUS
And he said
"Oh, when the dark side
Starts calling
Oh, let me know
Oh, when the dark side
Starts calling,
Call me up I'll be home."
Well I told him I wasn't in the habit
Of making long-distance phone calls
And I really hate ringing up
A bunch of debt.
There was a very long pause
At the other end of the line
He said "Phil
You can call collect!"
BRIDGE
I lit the fire in the morning
Let the scapegoats run away.
No sacrificing all the children,
Still a house, burned today
CHORUS
Now I wasn't sure if he was
Talking about some satanic telemarketers,
Or whether he meant the BIG "D" from hell
But really, when you stop and think about it
These days,
It's kinda hard to tell!
BRIDGE
CHORUS
Got a call today from Jesus
I swear it's true as I have told.
Well except maybe
The part about call waiting
He never put me on hold!
CHORUS
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I love writing a blues song with with a "Done me Wrong" theme (again, with the archtypal nasty girlfriend) Somehow I usually gravitate to a bit of wry humor, but this one seemed to resist any levity.
SOUTHBOUND TRAIN
I was goin' down to the station
I was travelin' by myself
I saw you there at the platform
But you were kissin' someone else.
The though, to me,
Came kinda slowly,
I know now that it was true
That you punched my ticket
An you'll punch his too.
CHORUS
It seems I'm goin' nowhere
On a funky southbound train
I told you I was leavin' cause the streets
Don't look the same.
I'll just pack all my bags up and get now
No cause to remain
That's how it ended up
I met the blues on a southbound train
I met the blues on a southbound train
I met the blues for your love.
I told myself I was lucky
I told myself we were through
And on this train headed for disaster
You were boarding too
I turned and walked away slowly
It seems that you just couldn't see
That a kiss you meant to hurt me
Set me free.
CHORUS
