The books
pile up. Fearful
pages that discourage
lion hunters.
Geographies
in four hundred volumes.
In the first ones,
there were full moons,
jasmine from the islands;
the last one
are only solitudes:
snow kingdoms,
stirrings of reindeer. - Pablo Neruda
They're calling me. The books on the wooden end table from my mother that sits next to my bed like a camel. The lamp and shade like a long neck and head, two stacked lumps of books sent or given by friends that I should read. That I will read.
Someday soon. I've made it a resolution this year to read more and talk less, but, as you're currently experiencing, I'm still talking.
Still - the books wait. In two piles - The Earth is Enough by Harry Middleton, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying by Sogyal Rinpoche, The Greatest Show on Earth by Richard Dawkins, The Importance of Being Iceland - Travel Essays in Art by Eileen Myles, Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon, Michael Keller's graphic adaptation of Darwin's Origin (this one is absolutely bitchin. Origin in comic book form? Holy Galapagos, Fitzroy!) Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett and a dog-eared and taped-up copy of The National Audubon Society's Pocket Guide to Constellations (because I almost always have my head in the clouds).
With the exception of Pratchett and Audubon, these books weren't purchased by me, aren't reflections of my browsings of the NY Times Book Review, nor reflect my finger on the pulse of current literary buzz. These books are reflections of the minds and choices of my friends, the people I love. It's a great show of confidence on their parts, sending these love letters to me. They're assuming much. Starting with the assumption that my attention span exceeds that of my dog's. And that's a big one.
So why the short attention span?
I spend so much time working, making phone calls, answering emails, being distracted by shiny objects - that I neglect the books, quite literally forget that I should stop and read. Sometimes forget where and who I am. So the books collect dust and bottles of lotion, bits of jewelry and kleenex while I wander the mirrored halls of my funhouse brain. In those fleeting minutes when I'm back with the world, I walk by the bedroom, hear the murmuring in the pages (a murmuring that Terry Pratchett depicts better than anyone ever will) and, well, even as I write, they're calling me.
I can imagine the friend who gave me each book running down a path in a snowy wood, calling back to me, 'Come on! You've gotta see this... it's amazing...'
And now I have to go, because everyone knows that a dog's gotta chase a running thing.
First stop, Iceland.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Saturday, January 30, 2010
Answer #25 - Alcohol & Putt-Putt Golf Don't Mix
I meant to study up on Happy Hour the world over - give some real, meaningful information - you know, in response to the alcoholic statement: 'It's Happy Hour somewhere! Bottoms Up!'
I didn't get around to it.
I know it's Happy Hour at 6:00p in Scotland. Of course, Happy Hour is 5:00p here in the U.S. In New Orleans and the entire state of Florida, Happy Hour is whatever hour it happens to be.
I lived in both Louisiana and Florida, so I know whereof I speak. There's a tacit agreement in the State of Florida that says: We're On Vacation. Perpetually. Doesn't make for graceful aging necessarily. But when you're carpe-ing the diem, what the hell is the future? And besides, there's botox, microdermasomething and they can inject fat cells from your ass directly into the lips that the blistering sun shrivels. How cool is that?
Anyway, I owned a restaurant in Marathon ('A Drinking Town with a Fishing Problem'), Florida Keys. This was after I lived in Southeast Asia & Louisiana, and prior to my move to Indiana. It was called Deadhead George's Mexicali Grill. I don't mean to rip off Dave Barry but, well, I'm not making this up. I still have the t-shirts and some of the Deadhead memorabilia. I'm not a Deadhead, but I was previously married to a Deadhead, and, well, it just seemed to make sense at the time.
The t-shirts had a couple of phrases on them: "It's like a piece of heaven, if heaven tastes like that" (a derivative kind of line based on the Talking Heads song 'Heaven') - and, my personal favorite: "Deadhead George's - Where the staff is as drunk as you are".
Again, not making it up.
My Landlord greeted me with a raised Bud Light every morning at about 7:00am from his boat - heading out to catch fish he didn't like to eat. Interesting guy who'd made a fortune building a putt-putt golf course somewhere in Pennsylvania, where no one said it could be done! Imagine! Putting a putt-putt there!? Whoa, Roger! It can't be done!
Actually, I've tried to imagine a couple of times, but to no end. Here in Bloomington, the woman who owned the big Putt Putt golf course shot and killed the man who owned it with her. Er, her husband. It's next door to the Jiffy Treet. Big scandal. Probably some tryst betwixt soft-serve maven & putt putt land baron - leading to late night, liquor-soaked confrontation. But that's just idle speculation.
What the hell is your point?
Well, that's obvious. Mixing Alcohol and Putt-Putt golf can only lead to no good. Don't do it. It's impossible to avoid the combination of the Grateful Dead and Mexicali-type food, but, well, do it in moderation. But, whatever happens, if you're considering picking up that lime green golf ball, put down the Bud Light. Before it's too late.
I didn't get around to it.
I know it's Happy Hour at 6:00p in Scotland. Of course, Happy Hour is 5:00p here in the U.S. In New Orleans and the entire state of Florida, Happy Hour is whatever hour it happens to be.
I lived in both Louisiana and Florida, so I know whereof I speak. There's a tacit agreement in the State of Florida that says: We're On Vacation. Perpetually. Doesn't make for graceful aging necessarily. But when you're carpe-ing the diem, what the hell is the future? And besides, there's botox, microdermasomething and they can inject fat cells from your ass directly into the lips that the blistering sun shrivels. How cool is that?
Anyway, I owned a restaurant in Marathon ('A Drinking Town with a Fishing Problem'), Florida Keys. This was after I lived in Southeast Asia & Louisiana, and prior to my move to Indiana. It was called Deadhead George's Mexicali Grill. I don't mean to rip off Dave Barry but, well, I'm not making this up. I still have the t-shirts and some of the Deadhead memorabilia. I'm not a Deadhead, but I was previously married to a Deadhead, and, well, it just seemed to make sense at the time.
The t-shirts had a couple of phrases on them: "It's like a piece of heaven, if heaven tastes like that" (a derivative kind of line based on the Talking Heads song 'Heaven') - and, my personal favorite: "Deadhead George's - Where the staff is as drunk as you are".
Again, not making it up.
My Landlord greeted me with a raised Bud Light every morning at about 7:00am from his boat - heading out to catch fish he didn't like to eat. Interesting guy who'd made a fortune building a putt-putt golf course somewhere in Pennsylvania, where no one said it could be done! Imagine! Putting a putt-putt there!? Whoa, Roger! It can't be done!
Actually, I've tried to imagine a couple of times, but to no end. Here in Bloomington, the woman who owned the big Putt Putt golf course shot and killed the man who owned it with her. Er, her husband. It's next door to the Jiffy Treet. Big scandal. Probably some tryst betwixt soft-serve maven & putt putt land baron - leading to late night, liquor-soaked confrontation. But that's just idle speculation.
What the hell is your point?
Well, that's obvious. Mixing Alcohol and Putt-Putt golf can only lead to no good. Don't do it. It's impossible to avoid the combination of the Grateful Dead and Mexicali-type food, but, well, do it in moderation. But, whatever happens, if you're considering picking up that lime green golf ball, put down the Bud Light. Before it's too late.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Answer #24 - Battling for Kelda
I keep thinking that somehow, this new global community will be the impetus to some form of human evolution. Not the Darwinian kind, but the movie kind. The Darwinian kind isn't based on best or brightest or prettiest or smartest, even, no matter what those funny Eugenics wackos thought. Nope, survival of the fittest is currently at work in humanity. The current fittest, however, don't look to be my own personal pick to carry the torch of the old double helix, but who am I to question the higher order?
No, I want movie evolution - the kind where, through contemplation of the errors of the past and wise foretelling of the probable future repetitions unless a course is altered [utilizing our increasingly shrinking frontal lobes..the little guys that determine consequence], enlightenment seeps in through the cracks in the gray matter, and, voila! Jean Luc Picard is driving the ship, and at least a good chunk of the human population has stopped running around banging their heads into trees! (I mean Bud Light cans).
You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one.
I think this should start by the appointment of a Wise Woman figure in every neighborhood, to solve disputes, provide guidance, and, well, offer wise counsel. In this way, pockets of peaceful co-existence might actually come into being long enough to slow down our nearly insatiable quest for a Fiery End, blossoming into larger pockets, and then towns, cities... Maybe resulting in less government intervention, fewer police, fewer jails, viable health care, boys in pants that aren't belted mid-thigh. You see the potential trend.
Seems to me that somewhere along the way, Wisdom (along with Intelligence, Rationality and Leadership) stopped getting pinned to the pink blankets, assigned only to the blue blankets, and, well, hundreds and hundreds of years of the metaphorical equivalent of half the human brain relegated to a dark corner to make mud pies and thumb through Cosmo (not to be confused with Cosmos), and... Oy! What a mess!
What the hell? You only got Half a Brain?! (Seriously, isn't this one of our most scathing insults..? let's ponder..)
So how do we go about this?
My favorite living author, Terry Pratchett, has a wise woman figure called a 'Kelda.' She wields a tremendous amount of power, but wisely, along side the 'Big Man.' She is a sage and maternal figure to a gigantic hive of 'Feegles' - red-headed, blue-tattoed pixies that drink and fight and steal cows and things - and she doesn't begrudge them their nature or the spoils of their campaigns, but neither does she let them torch the Feegle Hill nor the hills of others, profit off of or steal from the sick, profit from the sale of weapons inscribed with Bible verses, or torture living things in the name of gold or God.
Sadly, Keldas, in Pratchett's world, are born to it. Since we are neither pixies nor entirely fictional, we'll need a different plan. A reality TV show might work - 'Battling for Kelda' maybe. Set it up in every neighborhood across the country: A televised series of tests of skill, cunning, and wit, with teams in matching shirts with lots of candid and sentimental interview segments between challenges.
And then we could, by thoughtful question, choose the true Keldas from the group of women that did not show up for the auditions.
Just a thought.
No, I want movie evolution - the kind where, through contemplation of the errors of the past and wise foretelling of the probable future repetitions unless a course is altered [utilizing our increasingly shrinking frontal lobes..the little guys that determine consequence], enlightenment seeps in through the cracks in the gray matter, and, voila! Jean Luc Picard is driving the ship, and at least a good chunk of the human population has stopped running around banging their heads into trees! (I mean Bud Light cans).
You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one.
I think this should start by the appointment of a Wise Woman figure in every neighborhood, to solve disputes, provide guidance, and, well, offer wise counsel. In this way, pockets of peaceful co-existence might actually come into being long enough to slow down our nearly insatiable quest for a Fiery End, blossoming into larger pockets, and then towns, cities... Maybe resulting in less government intervention, fewer police, fewer jails, viable health care, boys in pants that aren't belted mid-thigh. You see the potential trend.
Seems to me that somewhere along the way, Wisdom (along with Intelligence, Rationality and Leadership) stopped getting pinned to the pink blankets, assigned only to the blue blankets, and, well, hundreds and hundreds of years of the metaphorical equivalent of half the human brain relegated to a dark corner to make mud pies and thumb through Cosmo (not to be confused with Cosmos), and... Oy! What a mess!
What the hell? You only got Half a Brain?! (Seriously, isn't this one of our most scathing insults..? let's ponder..)
So how do we go about this?
My favorite living author, Terry Pratchett, has a wise woman figure called a 'Kelda.' She wields a tremendous amount of power, but wisely, along side the 'Big Man.' She is a sage and maternal figure to a gigantic hive of 'Feegles' - red-headed, blue-tattoed pixies that drink and fight and steal cows and things - and she doesn't begrudge them their nature or the spoils of their campaigns, but neither does she let them torch the Feegle Hill nor the hills of others, profit off of or steal from the sick, profit from the sale of weapons inscribed with Bible verses, or torture living things in the name of gold or God.
Sadly, Keldas, in Pratchett's world, are born to it. Since we are neither pixies nor entirely fictional, we'll need a different plan. A reality TV show might work - 'Battling for Kelda' maybe. Set it up in every neighborhood across the country: A televised series of tests of skill, cunning, and wit, with teams in matching shirts with lots of candid and sentimental interview segments between challenges.
And then we could, by thoughtful question, choose the true Keldas from the group of women that did not show up for the auditions.
Just a thought.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Answer #23 - No, The Farmer's Almanac must be read in wire-rimmed glasses
Arbutus Responds to Monkey Drool:
Sanctimony came first, followed by Patrimony (by Alimony, out of Matrimony). The anthropologists say it's all ass-shaking, bared teeth and chest-banging. The anthropophagists say "Pass the salt", or "I'd like another slice of the loin, please." I sometimes conflate etymologists with entomologists, but then I'm buggy.
That was a funny blog. LOL.
----------------------------------------------------------
I've just finished breakfast at The Cracker Barrel, this, in no way, being an endorsement of said establishment, it is, however fact that I was there this morning eating the Egg Sandwich and Hash Brown Casserole. The roaring fire in the stone hearth, the wooden sleds and farm implements on the wall, pictures of someone's great grand daddy & baby aunt vivian in oval wooden frames, old metal signs for shoe shine polish and dairy products. Some genius' idea of dragging Norman Rockwell right outta the grave and teaching him to shuck biscuits & gravy.
It works, apparently, because the things have sprung up all over the country. And look at me, ma, feeling all warm and cozy in the land of trans-fats and high-fructose-corn-syrup-syrup...
We love the past these days. Look at TJ Max - we love stuff that looks old even if it's not old. All of the Architectural Renovation places gathering up all the hinges and doorknobs and floor grates that people used to toss in the garbage... we're grabbing on to something that seems to be receding rapidly - is it our history, our perspective, or just the same nostalgia that kicks in for everyone past the age of 22? (for reference, folks, all of the fodder for nostalgia you're going to build will probably have been stocked by then).
I don't know. The natural world's being replaced by the sharp-edged steel one alarmingly quickly. And me, I write songs - sometimes about people in other times and places. I don't feel nostalgic about it - just feel the sense of looking back at a time or place that appears more colorful due to the lenses I put on when writing - big, prismy rainbow glasses, like the kind Elton John used to wear - beams of light shooting every which way, and outlining a single image in a halo, like the Virgin of Guadalupe, but not like an aura, because I just can't take much of that crystal munching stuff. I like writing. This is why. Prism rainbow glasses and sometimes I put on platform shoes and pretend I'm Elton. Not often, and certainly not when anyone's looking.
So, is it appropriate to wear Elton John Rainbow Glasses in Cracker Barrel?
In Cracker Barrel, rainbow glasses and platform shoes would break the spell. No, in Cracker Barrel, my glasses are round, wire-frames and my collar buttons high on my neck. I speak of the weather, what the Almanac said to expect of the Spring rains and how the aunts and uncles are. I glance at the holiday tchotchke made by small Chinese children on my way out to my car. It's all a bit of a nasty illusion, the whole thing, and my dog wouldn't approve, but it speaks to something, even in all its schlocky corporate contrivance.
My mother loves the oatmeal there. I put on the glasses.
Sanctimony came first, followed by Patrimony (by Alimony, out of Matrimony). The anthropologists say it's all ass-shaking, bared teeth and chest-banging. The anthropophagists say "Pass the salt", or "I'd like another slice of the loin, please." I sometimes conflate etymologists with entomologists, but then I'm buggy.
That was a funny blog. LOL.
----------------------------------------------------------
I've just finished breakfast at The Cracker Barrel, this, in no way, being an endorsement of said establishment, it is, however fact that I was there this morning eating the Egg Sandwich and Hash Brown Casserole. The roaring fire in the stone hearth, the wooden sleds and farm implements on the wall, pictures of someone's great grand daddy & baby aunt vivian in oval wooden frames, old metal signs for shoe shine polish and dairy products. Some genius' idea of dragging Norman Rockwell right outta the grave and teaching him to shuck biscuits & gravy.
It works, apparently, because the things have sprung up all over the country. And look at me, ma, feeling all warm and cozy in the land of trans-fats and high-fructose-corn-syrup-syrup...
We love the past these days. Look at TJ Max - we love stuff that looks old even if it's not old. All of the Architectural Renovation places gathering up all the hinges and doorknobs and floor grates that people used to toss in the garbage... we're grabbing on to something that seems to be receding rapidly - is it our history, our perspective, or just the same nostalgia that kicks in for everyone past the age of 22? (for reference, folks, all of the fodder for nostalgia you're going to build will probably have been stocked by then).
I don't know. The natural world's being replaced by the sharp-edged steel one alarmingly quickly. And me, I write songs - sometimes about people in other times and places. I don't feel nostalgic about it - just feel the sense of looking back at a time or place that appears more colorful due to the lenses I put on when writing - big, prismy rainbow glasses, like the kind Elton John used to wear - beams of light shooting every which way, and outlining a single image in a halo, like the Virgin of Guadalupe, but not like an aura, because I just can't take much of that crystal munching stuff. I like writing. This is why. Prism rainbow glasses and sometimes I put on platform shoes and pretend I'm Elton. Not often, and certainly not when anyone's looking.
So, is it appropriate to wear Elton John Rainbow Glasses in Cracker Barrel?
In Cracker Barrel, rainbow glasses and platform shoes would break the spell. No, in Cracker Barrel, my glasses are round, wire-frames and my collar buttons high on my neck. I speak of the weather, what the Almanac said to expect of the Spring rains and how the aunts and uncles are. I glance at the holiday tchotchke made by small Chinese children on my way out to my car. It's all a bit of a nasty illusion, the whole thing, and my dog wouldn't approve, but it speaks to something, even in all its schlocky corporate contrivance.
My mother loves the oatmeal there. I put on the glasses.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Answer #22 - Monkey Drool
So I call Arbutus and leave the message: "I need the word that means the study of words.. Damn it. Epistomology, epidemiology... what the?! It's dropped out of my head and Google is thwarting me. Call me back."
Three days later the phone rings: "Etymology," she says. No hello.
"Day late and a dollar short," I say, "but thanks for having been the cause of my disastrous loss of the Facebook argument."
"Krista Detor, do not attempt to elicit my culpability in your quest to leave a trail of drool across the whole of the internet," she remarks, levelly.
"This is not drool! This is passionate discourse on the issues of the day! This is the meat and matter of the thing - the push and pull of ideas - the friction and fire that lights the synapses and alters the course of the world! Debate!," I counter.
"And what, pray tell, lit the fire of this particular world-altering exchange?"
"Oh, some kid posting comments in acronyms and shit. You know '4' to mean 'for' and 2 to mean 'to' and LOL and crap spelling, and no grammar or punctuation. Started every sentence with no capitals. He was really pissing me off."
"Goodbye." Click.
"Er..."
What came first? Indignation or Sanctimony?
I'm going with sanctimony. Because I'm always indignant in response to it, and, when I'm sanctimonious, I generally incur an indignant response from somebody.
I think they're equally powerful. Sanctimony being a resounding bonk on the head, and Indignation being a resounding jab to the solar plexus. Both are aggressive maneuvers intended to throw off the balance of the opponent, though, admittedly, indignation is slightly less powerful as it tends to be of a more defensive and er, whiny nature and your opponent absolutely sees it coming. But still, you can potentially cause your opponent to double over, so... it's worth the whine. [In my last life, I think I was a boxer... but that's another story for another time. Although if anyone would care to debate reincarnation, I'm in! No, no I'm not. I really should get some work done.]
We're funny monkey creatures. Banging our chests and showing our teeth... I keep thinking that the on-line trend of chest-banging and spinachy-teeth showing will go the way of the Macarena and the McCarthy Trials any day now... Any day now... Any...
Oook.
Three days later the phone rings: "Etymology," she says. No hello.
"Day late and a dollar short," I say, "but thanks for having been the cause of my disastrous loss of the Facebook argument."
"Krista Detor, do not attempt to elicit my culpability in your quest to leave a trail of drool across the whole of the internet," she remarks, levelly.
"This is not drool! This is passionate discourse on the issues of the day! This is the meat and matter of the thing - the push and pull of ideas - the friction and fire that lights the synapses and alters the course of the world! Debate!," I counter.
"And what, pray tell, lit the fire of this particular world-altering exchange?"
"Oh, some kid posting comments in acronyms and shit. You know '4' to mean 'for' and 2 to mean 'to' and LOL and crap spelling, and no grammar or punctuation. Started every sentence with no capitals. He was really pissing me off."
"Goodbye." Click.
"Er..."
What came first? Indignation or Sanctimony?
I'm going with sanctimony. Because I'm always indignant in response to it, and, when I'm sanctimonious, I generally incur an indignant response from somebody.
I think they're equally powerful. Sanctimony being a resounding bonk on the head, and Indignation being a resounding jab to the solar plexus. Both are aggressive maneuvers intended to throw off the balance of the opponent, though, admittedly, indignation is slightly less powerful as it tends to be of a more defensive and er, whiny nature and your opponent absolutely sees it coming. But still, you can potentially cause your opponent to double over, so... it's worth the whine. [In my last life, I think I was a boxer... but that's another story for another time. Although if anyone would care to debate reincarnation, I'm in! No, no I'm not. I really should get some work done.]
We're funny monkey creatures. Banging our chests and showing our teeth... I keep thinking that the on-line trend of chest-banging and spinachy-teeth showing will go the way of the Macarena and the McCarthy Trials any day now... Any day now... Any...
Oook.
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Answer #21 - Because you can shine turds
Sorry, that's a musical production term. The meaning is obvious: turning something not so great into something better. I realized, after posting the essay yesterday, that the song that came from it (below), which never made an album, gave me lines for four other songs that DID make the album.
So Why Bother Finishing a Song that's Not Coming Together and that you Actually Maybe Can't Stand because it might as well have been written by monkeys. With their own poo. Possibly on the trunk of a banana tree somewhere?
A friend, Peter, said, 'sometimes you've gotta get whatever it is out of the way, so the larger idea can make the light of day.' I could go on and on with the Poo euphamisms, but I'll tire you. And me. Suffice it to say that this is why I write down whatever happens to be kicking in my brain pan. The song might not gel, but right place, right time, one or two lines might find their way into more realized ideas.
In My Last Life
Verse 1
In my last life I was quiet
when the birds spoke - didn't understand it
Didn't care to, watched the sidewalk crack beneath me* __________________________________________________________
Verse 2
In my last life they were laughing
__________________________________________________________
*[And this for 'Delivery Me' - a song that did make the album:
Chorus
Take my last dollar bill and my last sleeping pill
and the last thing that you heard me say
take the incessant chatter of things that don't matter
Go on, take my last life away
Verse 3
In my last life, sugar lemons
stung my fingers where the cuts were
*[Took this for 'Lorca in Barcelona' (yes, on the new album):
Verse 4
In my last life someone showed me
things I wish I didn't know now
Hadn't seen it, Didn't feel it every hour upon hour upon hour upon hour
Chorus
Take my last dollar bill and my last sleeping pill
and the last thing that you heard me say
take the incessant chatter of things that don't matter
Go on, take my last life away
Verse 5
Monsters make them, leave the footprints
in the bathtub, rubber daisies
Look, my shadow, sewn to my toe, follows me
Verse 6
In my last life, monsters left them
left the footprints, didn't understand it
what the birds said in the backyard apple tree*
__________________________________________________________
*[And for 'Teeter-Totter on a Star' from the new album:
Chorus
Take my last dollar bill and my last sleeping pill
and the last thing that you heard me say*
__________________________________________________________
*[And this idea of speaking out of turn for 'Deliver Me' -
take the incessant chatter of things that don't matter
Go on, take my last life away
So Why Bother Finishing a Song that's Not Coming Together and that you Actually Maybe Can't Stand because it might as well have been written by monkeys. With their own poo. Possibly on the trunk of a banana tree somewhere?
A friend, Peter, said, 'sometimes you've gotta get whatever it is out of the way, so the larger idea can make the light of day.' I could go on and on with the Poo euphamisms, but I'll tire you. And me. Suffice it to say that this is why I write down whatever happens to be kicking in my brain pan. The song might not gel, but right place, right time, one or two lines might find their way into more realized ideas.
In My Last Life
Verse 1
In my last life I was quiet
when the birds spoke - didn't understand it
Didn't care to, watched the sidewalk crack beneath me* __________________________________________________________
*[I took this idea for an entirely different song that made the album: Recklessness & Rust' - "Across the bridges, through the moors, Across a million marble floors, the surface cracking at your feet so you tread lightly on the street.."]
__________________________________________________________Verse 2
In my last life they were laughing
saw me waiting for the next bus
Didn't notice, watched the light show - it was pretty* __________________________________________________________
*[And this for 'Delivery Me' - a song that did make the album:
"Deliver me from fools and wickedness and shiny things.."]
__________________________________________________________Chorus
Take my last dollar bill and my last sleeping pill
and the last thing that you heard me say
take the incessant chatter of things that don't matter
Go on, take my last life away
Verse 3
In my last life, sugar lemons
stung my fingers where the cuts were
no one's looking, get the sharp knife - sweet and sour*
__________________________________________________________*[Took this for 'Lorca in Barcelona' (yes, on the new album):
"He's calling out to the people, 'Come and try my oranges, try the sweet, sweet orange, pulling out his knife..'"]
__________________________________________________________Verse 4
In my last life someone showed me
things I wish I didn't know now
Hadn't seen it, Didn't feel it every hour upon hour upon hour upon hour
Chorus
Take my last dollar bill and my last sleeping pill
and the last thing that you heard me say
take the incessant chatter of things that don't matter
Go on, take my last life away
Verse 5
Monsters make them, leave the footprints
in the bathtub, rubber daisies
Look, my shadow, sewn to my toe, follows me
Verse 6
In my last life, monsters left them
left the footprints, didn't understand it
what the birds said in the backyard apple tree*
__________________________________________________________
*[And for 'Teeter-Totter on a Star' from the new album:
"Little sparrow says, "that's the way it is - nothing much is ever for free"]
__________________________________________________________Chorus
Take my last dollar bill and my last sleeping pill
and the last thing that you heard me say*
__________________________________________________________
*[And this idea of speaking out of turn for 'Deliver Me' -
"Deliver me from fools and holiness and Hollywood. A mouth full of soap might do a world of good - all the things I've said that no one ever should."]
__________________________________________________________take the incessant chatter of things that don't matter
Go on, take my last life away
Monday, January 25, 2010
Answer #20 - Sometimes an essay sparks a song
It's a fine line - the walk between prose writer, songwriter, and poet. I'll only ever claim songwriter as terra firma, but I dabble in many of forms, including play writing. Sometimes really badly. Other times, not so much. Sometimes a larger idea (or beast) is waiting just beneath the surface, and has to be dealt with before its abstraction can come into being. Or some such sanctimonious sh*t as that... but the thing is,
Where exactly is this going?
I thought it might be interesting to look at an essay that sparked a song. Interesting process. The song that followed remains unrecorded, might make an album someday, but didn't make this one. I'll post it tomorrow. For now, In my Last Life.
In my last life the curtains were drawn and the ocean's waves landed like giant's feet on a hardwood stage. I buried bits of wood, carved with my name and birth date all over the back yard and sat at a quiet table in a playhouse, nameless birds chirping bits of secret messages. I never tried to understand them. I made mud pies and dreamed of baby dolls sporting hair that grew longer and shorter with the turn of an arm.
I called across the brick wall that separated my neighbors from me - the girl, Ginger, and the boy, Butch - and I heard the sound of engines revving in the driveway across the street. Tattooed men laughing, boys bursting through the prickly shrubs with footballs and fingers held in Vees, for the peace signs people flashed in parades and marches, and the cigarettes they'd smoke later.
In my last life, monsters made daisy-shaped paw prints in the bathtub and the curtains were always drawn. The streetlights came on at 8:30 in the summer. Bikes were strewn on lawns and dogs slept restlessly, chained to backyard trees and immovable posts, dreaming doggy dreams of children wandering near who'd drop bits of half-chewed hot dog and bun; maybe endless dreams of fields of running, steak-shaped rabbits and long, long rivers where dogs swam to the sea.
I dreamed of a giant spider on the wall, they said, when my teeth were coming in, and two years later, told my mother that my grandmother had died, when, in fact, thousands of miles away, she had. My aunt whispered, conspiratorially, when I, an adolescent, sat gazing over her shoulder at the New York Times crossword puzzle; where I sat in her rococo living room with the thick gold shag carpet and porcelain reproductions of Marie Antoinette and Louis the XIV. 'They never told you, but it's true.. you told her before she got the phone call...'
My only prophecy, but still, dead on. No one ever asked for an encore.
In my last life, I floated down the river Seine on the back of a porcelain dog, while stone-faced boys lit firecrackers & cigarettes in the deep, black cul-de-saq. I watched my mother as I drifted by, pulling honeysuckles from the vines, one by one, and pushing them into the empty garden beds.
Where exactly is this going?
I thought it might be interesting to look at an essay that sparked a song. Interesting process. The song that followed remains unrecorded, might make an album someday, but didn't make this one. I'll post it tomorrow. For now, In my Last Life.
In my last life the curtains were drawn and the ocean's waves landed like giant's feet on a hardwood stage. I buried bits of wood, carved with my name and birth date all over the back yard and sat at a quiet table in a playhouse, nameless birds chirping bits of secret messages. I never tried to understand them. I made mud pies and dreamed of baby dolls sporting hair that grew longer and shorter with the turn of an arm.
I called across the brick wall that separated my neighbors from me - the girl, Ginger, and the boy, Butch - and I heard the sound of engines revving in the driveway across the street. Tattooed men laughing, boys bursting through the prickly shrubs with footballs and fingers held in Vees, for the peace signs people flashed in parades and marches, and the cigarettes they'd smoke later.
In my last life, monsters made daisy-shaped paw prints in the bathtub and the curtains were always drawn. The streetlights came on at 8:30 in the summer. Bikes were strewn on lawns and dogs slept restlessly, chained to backyard trees and immovable posts, dreaming doggy dreams of children wandering near who'd drop bits of half-chewed hot dog and bun; maybe endless dreams of fields of running, steak-shaped rabbits and long, long rivers where dogs swam to the sea.
I dreamed of a giant spider on the wall, they said, when my teeth were coming in, and two years later, told my mother that my grandmother had died, when, in fact, thousands of miles away, she had. My aunt whispered, conspiratorially, when I, an adolescent, sat gazing over her shoulder at the New York Times crossword puzzle; where I sat in her rococo living room with the thick gold shag carpet and porcelain reproductions of Marie Antoinette and Louis the XIV. 'They never told you, but it's true.. you told her before she got the phone call...'
My only prophecy, but still, dead on. No one ever asked for an encore.
In my last life, I floated down the river Seine on the back of a porcelain dog, while stone-faced boys lit firecrackers & cigarettes in the deep, black cul-de-saq. I watched my mother as I drifted by, pulling honeysuckles from the vines, one by one, and pushing them into the empty garden beds.
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