11-14-13

I want to hear a story, love,

Before we go to sleep.

Tell me why someone like you

Would want my heart to keep.

I’m like a storm, a hurricane

A mess of wind and wave.

Sometimes I’m a volcano burning

With nothing left to save.

While you shine like the sun above

I cross you like a cloud.

Yet if I think of leaving this

I hear your heart beat loud.

It tells me that with you I’m home,

That you can see my soul.

You’ll tame the storm and cool the fire

You’ll mend up every hole.

The woman who tried to fix herself

Is almost willing here

To let you kiss the pain away,

To wipe up every tear.

I don’t know what’s become of me,

This princess in her chains.

I don’t feel like myself tonight,

Everything is strange.

So tell me, Charming, if you can

How you found the witch in need

And saved her from herself at last

Though she could make you bleed.

Tell me why you love me still

When I can be quite mad

Then perhaps I’ll have the strength to say

You’re the best I’ve ever had.

Trading Souls for Peace

I waited for you by the sea

Until in the waves I drowned.

I stood in thunder, lightning, wind

Until I couldn’t hear a sound.

I laid in the desert until I burned

And still you never came.

Your promises I held tight to me

Yet each life it’s been the same.

In my darkest moments I went on alone

I found the sun myself.

And all the while you kept a picture

High atop a shelf.

Because that’s all I am, is it not?

A ghost to love from afar.

Someone that you tell others of

“She was once my star…”

It is easier to walk alone

When I know the hope is gone

Instead of believing lettered lies

Saying ‘Now it won’t be long.’

But I can’t deny the pain I feel

Knowing our sad past.

That you and I were made as one

And this ache will always last.

People often live with tragedy

After pieces fall apart.

But I’ve never known of a single person

Who has lived without their heart.

Your love has killed me through the years

I know you don’t recall.

But I’ve been cursed with sight, you see

And I’m haunted by it all.

So perhaps you could take the jar

The one where my heart beats.

Send it to me wrapped up safe

Before the past repeats.

And I’ll trade souls with one complete

A girl with hair of fire.

So she can search for you, her half

You’ll come, you’ll feel desire.

While I go on my way at last

Feeling like I’m whole.

How terrible that to find my peace

I have to trade my soul. 

The Ghost Town

I’ve been rocking back and forth all night

In a chair of rope and vine.

My ear strains to catch an echoed sound

Of a song played in my mind.

Voices murmur eerily

From my mirrored parlor door.

I have grown so used to them

I pay mind to them no more.

The only movement left in town

Is the softest summer breeze.

The magnolias swaying to that old tune,

They put my mind at ease.

The problem is the old won’t go

So the new can move on in.

They may have all passed long ago

But they built this town of sin.

They’ll be damned if death with stop them

And I guess I feel the same.

My body’s weak but my soul is not

I’ll beat the devil at his game.

He’d love to have us all, we know

But I’ll be as strong as they.

And when I die I’ll stay right here

Until my judgment day. 

My Lonely Soul to Take

The ghosts that travel these southern streets,

The old as well as new,

Have gathered to haunt this ancient house

What am I to do?

I can hear them walk along my halls

They took my mirrors down.

But one promised me just last night

That death doesn’t make a sound.

I don’t know why they come to me

But each one has its needs.

Some search in vain for lovers lost

Others rebel against misdeeds.

All I can do is let them in

And open up my heart.

But none will speak of what they’ve seen

Or why they can’t depart.

It makes me wonder if it’s a trick

To lure me to the grave.

Red brick dust and a bible worn

Are all I have to save.

So if the midnight comes and swallows me

I’ll know this was my fate.

I’ll join with those who took my home

In the perils we create. 

Leading Him Away

I wanted to know if you recall

One night so long ago

When you promised me the sweetest dream

And told me I could go.

I can’t say you disappointed me.

We lived it for a while.

Yes, you remember those few years

I can see it in your smile.

You played music, I sang and danced,

We spoke of love and peace.

Old age could never touch us there

We had our sweet release.

Didn’t we, my brilliant love?

Oh yes, by god, we did.

It was before we knew how cruel life is

Before the secrets that we hid.

So pure and so innocent,

Those unreal summer days.

I want to take you back tonight

Out of your dying haze.

To hell with what the dawn might bring

Just take my aging hand.

Our hearts have always known the way

Back to our magic land. 

The Enchanted Box

The enchanted box you gave to me

With our favorite tune inside

I took it out last night, my love

To see what it might hide.

Leave it to a sorcerer

Such as you were then

To create a thing of memories

So I could go again.

There they were, once thought lost,

The days we threw away.

Laughing on the beach at night,

Making love all day.

You must have known when you left it here

Someday it would make me weep.

You can’t know how it felt to see us young

This close to my last sleep.

But also so much like you were

You forgot one part.

I couldn’t join the things you’d saved

So I just left my heart.

With a key made up of jewels and rust

I unlocked that dusty door.

The beat was strong when I took it out

I don’t need it anymore.

Maybe someday this box will find

Someone who needs it too.

They’ll see us in youth and they’ll find my heart,

They’ll think of me and you.

Until then it will sit in darkness on a shelf,

That precious soul-filled thing,

And my ghost will guard it next to yours

Till once more that box can sing. 

A Hippie Lover's Prayer

Your ghost won’t let me go these days

And it has me thinking clear

Of things I once gave up to time,

Things that you held dear.

The youth we praised, the love we shared

I never would have guessed

The day would come when you would go

And I’d be like the rest.

Since the night you left my trembling arms

I gave up dreams for gold.

I was young enough to be naïve

So those precious years I sold.

They pulsed with you and all you were,

All you meant to me.

Because you weren’t the one left behind

You’ve no right to disagree.

The ideas overdosed your mind, I think

They helped to knock you dead.

I feared so much I’d end the same

So I gave it up instead.

Don’t shake your head like you have a right!

You never had to live!

Those years that made you weary, worn

I’ve had thirty more to give.

Perhaps in that dream where we once stayed

I have longed to go.

But reality wouldn’t give me up

To the world I used to know.

Now my hair is white, my skin is broke

My time is drawing near.

And all I ask of you, old love

Is that you swear I need not fear.

Promise heaven is a ‘Frisco day

And Janis will sing her song.

I want to know that when I pass

With you I’ll go along.