Ball and chain

Make a little more money
take a little more time from your friends
Makes it a little harder
to get started at
making amends

Making amends
because you took that time away from your friends
circular cycle
but I’m telling you now this has to end

I am tired of you
being your own ball and chain
you’re pushing me in circles girl
but this time I don’t come back again

Seven days
since I held your hand
Nineteen days
since I talked to you
Been a long time honey
but I don’t know how long it’s been
since I loved you

Perfect blonde

I used to know the perfect blonde
with a smile as wide
as a riverside

She could turn the moonlight on
like a shining light
on a midnight ride

In the end I let her go
She was never kind
with what was on her mind

Guess it only goes to show
that we sometimes find
love ain’t blind

And I said, ‘Looks don’t mean that much to me’
only now I see
I’m a liar
God in heaven give me reprieve
’cause I don’t believe
there is anything higher

I got with this flaming redhead
She never let me down
when she come around

Blazing like an Arctic sunset
going on and on
from dusk to dawn

She left me in the wintertime
and the irony
didn’t rust on me

Said, ‘stick it where the sun don’t shine’
such a symphony
of sympathy

And I said, ‘Looks don’t mean that much to me’
only now I see
I’m a liar
God in heaven give me reprieve
’cause I don’t believe
there is anything higher

Wouldn’t mind the wind

Arctic hillside
see a raven
dressed in black for sins he can’t atone

Stealing daylight
from the season
when a young man’s thoughts just turn to stone

A dying newborn squalling in the night
lacks the pathos of this raven’s flight
Wish that this were my ancestral home
Maybe then I wouldn’t be alone

and I

Wouldn’t mind the wind
wouldn’t mind the freedom way up there
wouldn’t mind just swimming in
an ocean full of air and sky
Wouldn’t mind the wind if I could fly

Time is rolling
like a boulder
down the steep decline that is my life
My chief achievement
getting older
dead-end job, dead child and grieving wife

I hear the cackling raven’s raucous jest
‘I bet you think your life’s some kind of quest
Like a glimpse inside a peep show booth—
that’s how I’d describe your search for truth.’

and I

Wouldn’t mind the wind
wouldn’t mind the freedom way up there
wouldn’t mind just swimming in
an ocean full of air and sky
Wouldn’t mind the wind if I could fly

[break]

I’m up at midnight staring at the sun
‘Cause there are things that cannot be undone
Guess I’ll wait till my last failing breath
to admit that I’ve got time for death

and I…

Back to my cave

Time was
I could share with a lover
never worryin’ ’bout another
come to share in my place

My loss
I guess I never discovered
the differences between me
and the human race

I know sharing’s a virtue
but you don’t like it
when I share my fears

I know I hurt you
I hurt me too
Maybe I should just get out
get out of here

Going back to my cave
Mm-hmm I’m gonna be brave
put down my club now
and I promise to behave ’cause I’m
going back to my cave

I know I’m less than
politically correct
Australopithecus
got nothin’ on me

But hear me now
and forgive me if I’m too direct
Neither one of us is ever gonna be free

I know love is a virtue
but how to love you
ain’t never been clear

I know I hurt you
I hurt me too
Maybe I should just get out
get out of here

Going back to my cave
Mm-hmm I’m gonna be brave
put down my club now
and I promise to behave ’cause I’m
going back to my cave

Not crying now

Take your petty feelings
and feed ’em
on your freedom
tell me it’s alright

Should’ve known this moment
was coming
by the drumming
of your heart tonight

But what you doing for me
if you’re not crying now?
Tell me how could can I feel?
Have I made you happy now?

I know I’m not the very
first lover
to discover
what a heart breaks like

And I guess I owe and emotional debt
to that tact that
you’ve exercised

But what you doing for me
if you’re not crying now?
Tell me how could can I feel?
Have I made you happy now?

Like an Angel

Face like an angel
with tears in her eyes
the memory of someone she knew

crept up behind her
caught her by surprise
so I just said the one thing I knew:

Still waters run deep
and deeper still
the thing called loneliness
a broken heart

can never be healed
nor even killed
The first is madness
and the second part

makes you cry like an angel
an angel who is lost to God
When you cry like an angel
nothing changes
nothing changes

There’s nothing to keep
and keeping still
won’t fill that emptiness
it’ll stop your heart

And just when you think
you’ve had your fill
the well of sorrow overflows
(sorrow overflows)

and you cry like an angel
an angel who is lost to God
When you cry like an angel
nothing changes
nothing changes

All the time and emotion
you invested’s just a drop in the ocean
’cause you did it all for you
and he did it all for him
and the sweetest songs
they got it wrong
when they said you could fall in love again

so you cry like an angel…
like an angel…

Something’s got to give

If we treat this romance like a venture
I’ll admit that it’s deep in the red
But a statement of debts and debentures
leaves one thing important unsaid:

Tell me why must it be
we should part company
if we don’t profit right from the start?

It seems clear to me
there’s no love industry
manufacturing a maintenance-free heart

And when push comes to shove
this old broken down love
is more than the sum of its parts

You cry, oh you cry
till you leak like a sieve
Don’t be surprised
Something’s always got to give.

What do I do

You’re not the one who brought me here.
You never built my hopes or fears.
You never touched me—not inside.
You never fed my foolish pride.
And now that we’re done
how do I do
justice to you?

What do I do?
What do I tell you?
You’re not the one who brought me here.
All of these nights we spent together
all these years
and years

they were for you.
They were forgotten
just as fast as they arrived.
Now I can’t say if we have lived or
survived—
just survived.

What do I do?
What do I tell you?
Why should I lie?
How do I keep my love alive?
What are my hopes?
What are these dreams?
Why did I stay here all this time?

Cambodge

A blind man turned to face me
and the Buddha in the back of a truck
I don’t know why he chose to grace me
with a look
but it stuck

And the Buddha said,
‘Don’t follow me’
And the blind man said,
‘Then set me free’

There’s a buffalo in the basement
and a paddy at the bar getting drunk.
He said, ‘If they don’t find a replacement
with my luck
I’ll be sunk.’

And the barman said,
‘I’m seeing red
‘Cause I’ve just been told
my tiger’s dead.
And my freehold over the ocean’s
gone to seed.’

There are angels under the arches
and every one of them wants to fuck.
And the legless man as he lurches
in the dark
tries his luck.

And the angel says,
‘You can marry me.’
And the legless man
says, ‘Set me free.’

You say remember when
back in old Phnom Penh
but that was now
and this is then
and your freedom’s floating skyward
on the breeze.

Talking about it herself

Attitudes and affiliations
are a constant cause
of callous consternation
in this tough-taking town
in this alienation
she’s pretending she’s down
on the situation
she don’t

don’t know but she’s talking about it herself
don’t know but what she’s talking about is herself

She claims she’s the cause of its condemnation
but her ladylike whisper was its inspiration
she’s the guiding light of a generation
but it’s whispered she’s the plight
of half the world’s population
she don’t

don’t know but she’s talking about it herself
don’t know but what she’s talking about is herself