1. |
Secrets That You Knew
02:07
|
|||
|
You spoke a world I could not see
Yet those images are all you left to me
I speak your name to empty air
I never hear an answer
But I'm told life's never fair -
The pain I feel is precious
When I know I'm missing you
No one could ever know of me
The secrets that you knew.
I lie in bed but do not sleep
And I count my memories instead of sheep
Sometimes I hear you on the stair
But when I reach the doorway
I find there's no one there -
This pain I feel is precious
My sole souvenir of you
No one could ever know of me
The secrets that you knew.
|
||||
2. |
||||
|
So now I see you there again alone
With your smoky fingers walking
And your talking telephone
And your faces rise before me
Like the changing tv screen
Your excuses never bored me
But I still can't try to tell you
What they mean.
So are you still the bowling alley queen?
And are the boys still running
To your three chord strumming scene?
Is your hand as sleight as ever?
Are your fingernails still clean?
Yeah, your acts were always clever
But I still can't try to tell you
What they mean.
I've spent a hundred hours
Playing scenes inside my head
And nothing that we ever did
Matched up with what we said.
And when my train ground out the days we had
You stood pretending nothing's ending
No need to feel sad.
And when I think about you then
In your cowboy hat and jeans
I remember every where and when
But I still can't try to tell you
What they mean.
|
||||
3. |
Down in That River
02:17
|
|||
|
I'm going down to the river
But I'm not taking stick or line
I'm leaving in the morning
And I'm not taking stick or line
I'm gonna lay down in that river
Let those waters wash my hurting mind.
I been a long time looking
But there's nothing here to find
I left my home and my family to find
That there's nothing here to find
I'm gonna lay down in that river
I won't be back for supper time.
Well the sun's too hot
Or the wind is too damn cold
You get nothin' for what you bought
You got nothin' or what you sold
I'm gonna lay down in that river
This place is gotten old.
|
||||
4. |
||||
|
In the morning's quiet hours
Or the evening's after glow
I've heard the jays and vireos
Telling me to go -
Sometimes I've packed for leaving
But my bag don't leave the floor
Cause I know you're with me somehow here
And you ain't beyond that door.
CHORUS:
Oh why, you ask me why
I just don't know -
It's so hard to move ahead
And just let go -
I understand the sun must set
And the river has to flow
But alone now in the darkness
How am I supposed to row?
It's funny how it happens
When someone's past this test
It's the unimportant moments
That we all remember best -
The way you'd say "I'm hungry"
As you passed your plate for more
And I know somehow you're with me here
Like you ain't beyond that door.
CHORUS.
Well the whiskey bottle's empty
And the ashtray's almost full
Outside I see your garden sitting
And I've got some weeds to pull -
It's a better job than sleeping
But you're the only one I'd do it for
Cause I know you're with me somehow here
But you ain't beyond that door.
CHORUS.
|
||||
5. |
Your Literary Notions
02:01
|
|||
|
I have never blamed you
For being what you're not
But I can't keep on saving you
Every time you think you're caught.
You say the truth is boring
Life is fiction if it's fine
But there's something that you never
Chose to mind:
When you create yourself
Don't leave anyone behind.
You made the rounds of gin joints
And you talked like Lady Brett
And all your phrases flowed from books
That you never did quite get.
Sometimes you were the party
And you fooled them every time
But there's something that you never
Chose to mind:
When you create yourself
Don't leave anyone behind.
What'd you get from all those books you read?
Is there anything of you left in your head?
I recall when you thought Plato
Was Mickey Mouse's friend -
So you weren't so bright
But you sure were more fun then.
So you wandered through Pamplona, Spain
And got drunk in Paris, France
You sat in cafes when it rained
And got laid at every chance.
You tell me you're a writer
But I've yet to see a line
And here's something that you never
Chose to mind:
When you create yourself
Don't leave anyone behind.
I think it's high time you
Were leaving me behind.
|
||||
6. |
Home for the Funeral
02:19
|
|||
|
The last train left - you were too young to know
You took what could be taken where you had to go
But you couldn't come back once you went through that door
There's no one home to welcome you no more
Your book life brought you far as you could run
There's no forgiveness for the things you never done.
He told you what to read and what the wise men say
He showed you how to work and taught you when to play
In the evening, by the fire, with you near
He read to you of Hamlet and King Lear
But you never understood nothing was won
There's no forgiveness for the things you never done.
Your watch reads one but now it's half past eight
Leave what you left before - already it's too late
The hands up on the wall won't stop for you
You gave away your past for something new
And time don't turn around for anyone
There's no forgiveness for the things you never done.
|
||||
7. |
Betsy's Song
03:13
|
|||
|
You know, sometimes I linger on long yesterdays -
Forgotten faces lost to time
Brothers to lean on, Sisters to show the way
Through all the hills I had to climb
And to so many faces, at places in my road,
I've reached out to find a hand
Somebody to help me let go my heavy load
Someone to say they understand.
And it was you in the valleys
And it was you upon high ground
Every hand that I reached for
It was your hand that I found -
And it was you in the shadows
And it was you in the light
And now it's you I call my love,
My wife, tonight.
You know, sometimes I wonder how you stayed so long
Or how you understood my pain
And if I took you for granted
Well, you know that I was wrong
And you won't hurt that way again.
Cause it was you in the valleys
And it was you upon high ground
Every hand that I reached for
It was your hand that I found -
And it was you in the shadows
And it was you in the light
And now it's you I call my love,
My wife, tonight.
Yes, it's you I call my love,
My wife tonight.
|
||||
8. |
||||
|
Lily Soft in amber light
Holding back the sleepless night
I'll have this time even when you go
Whispers caught in the fire's glow.
I forget what I have lost
Touching you I forget the cost
Forget the pain of the tempest blow
In whispers caught in the fire's glow.
And when you rise to leave don't say good-bye
Don't brush my cheek and tell me some sweet lie
I'll keep this fire burning
I'll never bolt this door
Until that day when I hold you once more.
While you can, then, stay awhile
Touch and teach my lips to smile
Your eyes show worlds which I need to know
In whispers caught in the fire's glow.
|
||||
9. |
Take a Bow
03:33
|
|||
|
Take the bottle from the shelf space
Take the mirror from the wall
I don't want the stare of my face
When the door slams in the hall.
It's a long way from forever
To where you're going now
But I guess success is sweet
So if we ever meet
Take a bow.
You were happy being hometown
Or at least that's what you said
But I see what's known is outgrown
Like a crib or marriage bed.
We're a long way from that Sunday
When we stood and took our vow
But I guess success is sweet
And if we ever meet
Take a bow.
Take a bow for the performance of a life
For pretending to be happy as my wife
And if I chance to see you now
Please don't smile and turn away
Just take a bow
That's the way to end a play.
You take the suitcase from the bedroom
Now I hear you on the stairs
You make your exit from our love's tomb
Wearing a face some actress wears.
It's a long way from forever
To where you're going now
But I guess success is sweet
So if we ever meet
Take a bow.
|
||||
10. |
The Widower
03:07
|
|||
|
There's a stillness after sunset
In the shadows in the dark
I take my coffee on the porch
And I watch the cigarette arc -
For fireworks it can't be beat
My extra after dinner treat
Before my evening walk.
I used to go to Josie's house
But the girls ain't there no more
They closed her down with Seidler's Pub
So I walk to Jason's store -
Sometimes I have a bottled beer
And pick up what there is to hear
But I don't know what for.
I keep my weight down, watch my food
And wait beside the phone
My boy, he don't call much no more
But it's best I keep round home -
And I've got books I've meant to read
And radiators soon to bleed
With Winter coming on.
But those shadows after sunset
And the quiet that they bring
They conjure up the damndest ghosts
And they set me to thinking -
Of all the questions of the past
The most damned fool one ever asked
Is `Death, Where is Thy Sting'.
|
||||
11. |
Passages to Memories
02:11
|
|||
|
Passages to memories
Paths to long ago
Silent feet that softly tread
Their way through silent snow.
Photos in an album, pictures in a book
And nothing else remains of all I gave
Of all I took.
Smiling at seventeen
Now looking back at thirty four
If I knew now what I knew then
It'd be something living for.
Now I know what happened
To those certain dreams
Now I know that nothing ever is
Just what it seems.
I don't know now
What I didn't know then -
How to call you back again
How to be the honest friend
You needed and allowed
Voiceless visions
Float before my eyes
And sunsets show me
Long forgotten skies
Show me passages to memories
And dreams of long ago
Time moves on, that past is gone
Which we both used to know.
And dreams are left on dusty shelves
To die and then decay
Those things we loved in innocence,
Just like our youth,
Pass quietly away.
|
||||
Joshua J. Mark Staatsburg, New York
If you like Joshua J. Mark, you may also like:
The Edge of the Land
by Katie Spencer
Spencer's indie folk sophomore album was recorded live in the studio over the course of two days.
go to album
A Place Like Home
by Mr. Alec Bowman_Clarke
The new EP from Scottish songwriter Alec Bowman_Clarke goes deep, setting vulnerable lyrics to gentle melodies & stripped-back arrangements.
go to album
I Used To Be Sad & Then I Forgot
by Mr. Alec Bowman_Clarke
Alec Bowman perfectly captures the dark soil under the pastoral world of British folk with this collection of melancholy originals.
go to album
For She Who Hangs The Moon
by David Luximon
Expansive music that has the gentle hush of ambient and the insistent pulse of post-rock; enveloping and absorbing.
go to album
Starry Skies Opened Eyes
by Silver Jackson
featured on Bandcamp Radio Jul 21, 2015
go to album
Father and daughter team up to make pretty folk music inspired by the day she was born and the day she'll leave home.
go to album
Veneer (20th Anniversary Deluxe Edition)
by José González
featured on Bandcamp Radio Aug 29, 2023
go to album
