Half Moon

That morning sky gave me a look.
So I left while you were sleeping- that's all it took.
And I chalked a line south down the coast,
going where my thirst was open for the things that I don't know;
going where I wasn't paying for the hurt that I owe.

One half moon sleeping by the creeks
and a woman put me under her barn roof for a week.
I knew her voice before she spake.
I saw a grave dug by a preacher just to see what it would make.

So hold high how faint your reasons.
Boy, you'll never get on.
Don't you forget you come from nothing.
Boy, you'll never get on.
That wind is calling my name and I won't wait, or I'll never get on.

It's not hard to live like a ghost.
I just haunt all that I've wanted and leave what I don't.
I dreamt a trail up to the sky
and my brothers built propellers just to see how far they'd fly.

So hold high how faint your reasons.
Boy, you'll never get on.
Your flashing sparrows chasing with them.
Boy, you'll never get on.
Don't you forget you come from nothing.
Boy, you'll never get on.
That wind is calling my name and I won't wait, or I'll never get on.

Always

Holy road we are on tonight,
catch as catch can 'till we get it right.
Always in this dark light, always.

Tell me more than what you can guess,
feel like thunder then quick to forget.
Always looking for what is not yet, always.

Lock the keys in my house tonight,
hit the steps for the morning light.
Always looking for a new life, always.

Keep You Right

These stars wash over me so far away that I can barely breathe from where I lay.
And never have I been so far from home or the years I was cut from sand and rain.
I'm calling through ebb and flow.
I'm calling whichever way it goes.

Desert rock and rosemary carry dry and bloodless on the breeze, make me new.
Blow into my face again, blow between the bones that shake and knock me through and through.
I've been away so long I lost you, my love, my song and sight.
You give me anything you want to.  I'm bound to keep you right.

My heart longs for too much and mine eyes have hardly seen enough to know its need.
Never does it stop or slow.  I press my ear against the ground to know the song it sings.
I'm calling, fear running through.
I'm calling.  What more can I do?  Tell me, what more can I do?

I've been away so long I lost you, my love, my song and sight.
You give me anything you want to.  I'm bound to keep you right.

We Are The Tide

Our time is ever on the road, the ride is in what we make.  
I walked a year to hear a howl in this give and take.  
But hear it this way- Hear it this way.

And war is in our hearts and blood is in the land we love.
We keep breaking our backs, hoping that it gives enough.
But what do you need?  What do you need?

Oh man, it's ladders to the sky, building up a high-rise.
Oh man, we won't last long but we're giving it our best try.
Don't you know you're alive? You know you're alive.
And none of us stay the day we're born 'till when we-

And tonight I'm in love with everybody on the city bus.
I feel the push and pull, keep saying that it doesn't mean much.
But what do you see?  What do you see?

And everybody on the street is singing like it's Sunday,
But we keep inside and our looks stay at bay.

And we don't know what left but we feel it's coming back soon.
And so we're standing in the street staring at a blood-red moon.
Well, we are the tide.  We are the tide,
And none of us stay the day we're born 'till when we-

The Colored Night

I was in between, I was an offering
I was a burning branch.
Close to feeling tall, almost a free fall.
I was made of chance.
And when the colors bleed, mix up my memories,
when I write it new,
I'll just be a sound you heard.  I'll be a foreign word
that's meaning your type of blue.  And I'll leave that here with you.

Oh our lines will blur but you've got a face like no other,
I'll keep it where I see things right.
Oh a darkness comes, but you've got a way like no other one.
I'll keep it where my black keeps light.
Make me a mirror of all that I cannot love.
Let me hold the cast
of my favorite years, the truth how they gave me here.
And let that be last.  Let that be my last.

Oh our lines will blur but you've got a face like no other,
I'll keep it where I see things right.
Oh a darkness comes, but you've got a way like no other one.
I'll keep it where my black keeps light.

In a darkness I do not know,
If it takes me, I'll feel you glow.
In a darkness I do not know,
Oh our lines will blur but you've got a face like no other,
I'll keep it where I see things right.
Oh a darkness comes, but you've got a way like no other one.
I'll keep it where my black keeps light.

I Know

Salting the silence, boiling my blood,
giving and honest is not thick enough.
And now have you gone easy, let your lines get caught?
Some sink and some carry and you will not,
No, you will not know
if it holds you
'till you set straight where you're going to.
You'll not know ‘till it breaks us,
pulls you under, if you'll give up.   
You'll not know.

For what is this comfort?  Is it asking too much,
when you hold me in hunger and I feel your touch?
When I feel your touch,
I know
where the day ends.  All my lines meet
the horizons.
I know, I know, I know
I can do this and the hard days
I won't miss.
I know, I know, I know, I know
like it's scarred in
where my place is; where I'm going.
I know, I know, I know
I'm a lost one.
And it's too late.  I'm far gone.

White Apple

In shadow,
in dark,
in cold wind, open up your heart.
'Cause time brushes
your face
and one loved them- every new shape.
One loved them for what could not get left behind or washed away.

Some were seasons,
some just days.
I'm bringing nothing with me I mean to save:
This faint sweetness,
this wick of light,
this white apple full of bites.
A white apple full of what
has slipped away from me;
full of flesh sweet as memory;
full of hope grown from a fallen tree;
full of a life I can't just let myself believe.
So if I haunt you,
if I do,
if my shadow leans up on you too,
No good intentions
or ways I talk.
I'll just leave a light lit for you to walk.
I'll leave a light lit for you to walk.

Just One

Let all things be as they should.
Let my heart just drift like wood.
And will I break and will I bow,
if I cannot let it go?

Feel that sun just hold you right,
leave you burning down the night.
Feel that wind lap up your soul,
if you cannot let it go.
If I cannot let it go.

Born in with a reason,
blown out like a ghost.
We came with our best lines-
told them like jokes.
If I could have known then we were dying to get gone…
I can't believe we get just one.

And when your thirst can come to me,
I am a river for the sea.
When you can hold me in your sway,
I give myself away.
Will I give myself away?

Born in with a reason,
blown out like a ghost.
We came with our best lines-
told them like jokes.
If I could have known then we were dying to get gone…
I can't believe we get just one
Let all things be as they will.
Let my heart beat itself still.

Get It Out

It was a wild idea to start.
We were lost in an hour, everything came apart.
In the middle of nowhere- "Oh man, hey look where we are."

I know your teeth are shut and proud,
but there are rhythms in the city, make your head feel loud.
So get it out, get it out.

You are a long ways up river from home.
Right here this water is mean but it's the same as your own.
You'd better swim for your life.  It's both at the same time.

It was a wild idea to start.
A drip on the head got it wet in the heart.
And it looked just like a river but was a freeway in the dark.

Boy were you always so ready?
I never want to call it off.
I have never been this ready in my life.

New York

I hear the train all night, sound of its wind blowing through
our subtle lives.
And I have a job to do, walking these cars, walking all this sleep
to get to you.
But I don't feel you stir beside me,
and you're not in my morning hours.

Some ties are made to break.  Some stalks grow high and green to rot away
and feel the weight.
And these lines tell a truth.  These city veins answer all we do.
So could you keep me in the pulses?  
Could you keep me in the sound?

I got wise and I got old.  Not once- not once did I fold
so don't you now.

Maybe you bet on me while we were still young enough to know
what to believe.
But for every year you took, for every soft breath or loving look,
believe me.
And don't keep me like you have me,
and don't kiss me like you don't.

I got wise and I got old.  Not once- not once did I fold
so don't you now.

Some land holds a home.  Some of my years only hold
me to roam.
But I tell myself it's true- you see a home, you see a man.
You see it too.
And I say, "Don't you know you have her?
Go on kiss her now, you boy."

I got wise and I got old.  Not once- not once did I fold
so don't you now.