Crystals

It seems that all I want to do is sleep these days

Wake up in about a year and not feel this way

-- Natalie Lew (Sea Lemon) 2024

Wanna Be Loved

I've been afraid, and I've been alone
Sometimes I need someone to pick up the phone
I'm tired of the leavin'
I need a home

I just wanna be loved
Can you tell me I'm worthy or important
Am I workin' hard enough?
I just wanna be loved

And I want someone to want me
I want somebody there
And I need someone to need me
I need someone who cares

-- Brandon Coleman (Red Clay Strays) 2024

Dream a Little Dream of Me

Stars shining bright above you

Night breezes seem to whisper "I love you"

Birds singin' in the sycamore tree

Dream a little dream of me

Say "nighty-night" and kiss me

Just hold me tight and tell me you'll miss me

While I'm alone and blue as can be

Dream a little dream of me

Stars fading, but I linger on, dear

Still craving your kiss

I'm longing to linger 'til dawn, dear

Just saying this

Sweet dreams 'til sunbeams find you

Sweet dreams that leave all worries far behind you

But in your dreams, whatever they be

Dream a little dream of me

-- Gus Kahn (1931)

Ship of Fools

We're setting sail to the place on the map
from which no one has ever returned.
Drawn by the promise of the joker and the fool,
By the light of the crosses that burned.
Drawn by the promise of the women and the lace
and the gold and the cotton and pearls.
It's the place where they keep all the darkness you need.
You sail away from the light of the world on this trip.

You will pay tomorrow

Avarice and greed are gonna drive you over the endless sea.
They will leave you drifting in the shallows
or drowning in the oceans of history.
Traveling the world, you're in search of no good.
But I'm sure you'll build your Sodom like you knew you would.
Using all the good people for your galley slaves
as your little boat struggles through the warning waves.
But you don't pay...

You will pay tomorrow

Save me from tomorrow
I don't want to sail with this ship of fools

-- Karl Wallinger (World Party) 1986

Again a Game... Again

Take my hand
Colors seem so black inside your head
Does everything reflect the time you spend?

So tired of thinking
You hide your face
Don't ask me to excuse

...

Save your words
They're never there for those who try
A stranger in a world, no longer mine

Sometimes I'm feeling used
I'll change my place
I'd sooner be excused

...

There are times, I confess, I'm not easy to accept
So come find, I'll react
I'm a reason to be there

I'm only laughing...

-- Mark Hollis (Talk Talk) 1984

Reason or Rhyme

Why must you shed such tender tears
In the evening of your years?
No other love could stem the tide
Of the loneliness I hide.
Open your heart and let me live!

No reason or rhyme, by chance or design...
Just a dance to the music of time.

-- Bryan Ferry (2010)

Tomorrow

Tomorrow never comes.
What kind of fool do they take me for?
Tomorrow, a resting place for bums,
A trap set in the slums.  But I know the score.

Tomorrow, as they say, all work and no play.
What do they take me for?
Tomorrow, an awful price to pay.
I gave up yesterday, but they still want more.

-- Lottie Pendlebury (Goat Girl) 2018

Predictable

Go to my office, sit at my desk

Predictably just like all of the rest

I sit and I dream about far away places

Away from the people with frowns on their faces

All of my life is monotony

I'd go out for a walk, but I know it would be... predictable

Sure as the nose on my face

Same for the whole human race

Once we had so many options

Once we had dignity and grace

Now we have got nothing but our own time to waste

-- Ray Davies (The Kinks) 1981

Working Class Hero

As soon as you're born, they make you feel small
By giving you no time, instead of it all
'Til the pain is so big you feel nothing at all

They hurt you at home, and they hit you at school
They hate you if you're clever, and they despise a fool
'Til you're so f*cking crazy you can't follow their rules

When they've tortured and scared you for twenty-odd years
Then they expect you to pick a career
When you can't really function, you're so full of fear

Keep you doped with religion and sex and TV
And you think you're so clever and classless and free
But you're still f*cking peasants as far as I can see

There's room at the top, they are telling you still
But first you must learn how to smile as you kill
If you want to be like the folks on the hill

A working class hero is something to be

-- John Lennon (1970)

Ticket to the Moon

Remember the good old 1980s? When things were so uncomplicated?
I wish I could go back there again, and everything could be the same.

I've got a ticket to the Moon. I'll be leaving here any day soon.
I've got a ticket to the Moon, but I'd rather see the sunrise in your eyes.

Got a ticket to the Moon. I'll be rising high above the Earth so soon.
And the tears I cry might turn into the rain that gently falls upon your window.  You'll never know.

-- Jeff Lynne (Electric Light Orchestra) 1981

The Garden

The arrow flies when you dream

The hours tick away, the cells tick away
The Watchmaker keeps to his schemes
The hours tick away....

 

The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect
So hard to earn, so easily burned
In the fullness of time, a garden to nurture and protect

 

In the rise and the set of the sun
'Til the stars go spinning 'round the night
It is what it is

And forever, each moment a memory in flight

 

-- Neil Peart (Rush) 2012

Time

Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day, 

Fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way.
Kicking around on a piece of ground in your home town,
Waiting for someone or something to show you the way.

Tired of lying in the sunshine,
Staying home to watch the rain.
You are young and life is long,
And there is time to kill today.

And then one day you find
Ten years have got behind you.
No one told you when to run,
You missed the starting gun.

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again.
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older,
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter never seem to find the time.
Plans that either come to naught or half a page of scribbled lines.
Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way.
The time is gone, the song is over,
Thought I'd something more to say.

-- Pink Floyd (1973)

Time

Time speaks with golden words
When there's nothing to be heard
Hides behind the stars
Silver in the night
Lies in the coming light

Time living with today
In a lonely way
She whispers never a surprise
She won't tell you why

Time speaks her golden tongue
And when everything is done
She lies to no one

-- Screaming Trees (1990)

All Things Must Pass

Now the darkness only stays at nighttime
In the morning, it will fade away
Daylight is good at arriving at the right time
It's not always going to be this gray

All things must pass
All things must pass away

-- George Harrison (1970)

Heartland

See the sun rise over her skin.
Dawn changes everything...
Everything.
And the delta sun
Burns bright and violet.

Mississippi and the cotton wool heat.
66 -- a highway speaks
Of deserts dry,
Of cool green valleys,
Gold and silver veins
Of the shining cities.

In this heartland...
In this heartland soil.

See the sun rise over her skin,
She feels like water in my hand.
Freeway like a river cuts through this land
Into the side of love
Like a burning spear.

And the poison rain
Brings a flood of fear
Through the ghost ranch hills.
Death valley waters
In the towers of steel.
Belief goes on and on.

-- Bono (U2) 1988

two suns in the sunset

In my rear view mirror, the sun is going down
Sinking behind bridges in the road. 
I think of all the good things that we have left undone,
And I suffer premonitions -- confirmed suspicions -- of the holocaust to come.

The rusty wire that holds the cork that keeps the anger in
Gives way, and suddenly it's day again.
The sun is in the east even though the day is done.
Two suns in the sunset; could be the human race is run.

-- Roger Waters (Pink Floyd) 1983

buried by the blues

Absolved forever into the darkest shades,
I'll vanish from the light to the still-calling me
Enslaved forever or buried by the blues?
Wear your wounds like a soldier; and let your ghosts run loose

Exploding waves, you wish you could belong
A piper at the gates to steal you from the dawn
No suicide could ever change your fate
Fold your hands in reply beneath the trembling rain

Against the night, you will rise and set your body free
Frontier of light, you desire to let your body sleep
Away from the static and noise
Away from the bombs and the war

-- Stephen McBean (Black Mountain) 2010

I Wanna Stay Home

When you need someone, and there's no one there
There is always the 9:00 train to take you out somewhere

I take the train in town, like I did for years
There is only seven more blocks; I could walk from here

It's only six o'clock when my day begins
There is always my alarm clock to wake me up again

When I realize the weight that's firmly on my shoulders
I just try and find the place I can take a walk on my blind side 

When these memories fade in my ripe old age
Please remember, my dear...

I wanna stay home
I wanna stay home right here
I wanna stay home today

I wanna stay.... 

-- Andy Sturmer (Jellyfish) 1990

The King is Half Undressed

Blue Autumns
Sunshine Kisses
Hearts and Flowers
Broken Wishes

-- Roger Manning / Andy Sturmer (Jellyfish) 1990

crossed out name

I kiss her mouth, and I know
For everything there is a word.
For everything but this.

I like the dresses, the shoes, and the clothes
And everything you know that goes
With loving a girl, I suppose.

I wish I could tell you just how I'm hurt.
Pinpoint the location -- it's in another universe.
When I close my eyes, I see a fire so plain
And my crossed-out name.

-- Ryan Adams (2008)