LYRICS

My Backyard

 

 

And I remember how it was.

I loved you just because,

And that was that.

I always knew where love was at

in my backyard

In my backyard

In my backyard.

 

Alive, we had a lovely time.

The world was yours and mine.

It all made sense.

The arch of April up the fence

in my backyard.

In my backyard.

In my backyard.

 

When all through the summer, I was overcast,

Black when the sky was blue.

You were the one who sat me in the grass

and gave me a talking to

in my backyard.

My backyard—

My backyard—

My backyard—

 

And time, we measured by degree

as you reminded me

what mattered most.

That happiness could be as close

as my backyard

As my backyard.

As my backyard

 

When all through the summer, I was overcast,

Black when the sky was blue.

You were the one who sat me in the grass

and gave me a talking to

in my backyard.

In my backyard.

In my backyard.

 

In my backyard

In my backyard.

 

 

 

 

Dizzy

 

 

Dizzy, put on your smiling face today,

They want to see you out on top.

Winning at every game you play,

But only when the voices stop.

 

You know they’re not real,

But you feel so dizzy where you are.

Dizzy, where you are.

Ah—

 

Falling out of a perfect shade of blue,

They wonder why you don’t respond.

And in the life, you’re passing through,

You know you’re barely holding on.

 

 

But when you let go,

You feel so dizzy where you are.

Dizzy, where you are.

Ah—

Ah—

 

You’ll want to let it out,

After you take it in.

There’s no use holding on to all that oxygen.

Oxygen.

 

But when you let go,

You feel so dizzy where you are.

Dizzy, where you are.

Dizzy, where you are.

Ah—

Ah—

Ah—

 

Sundial

 

 

I thought of holding my breath too long,

To go to sleep in our little garden.

To leave you run with the swarm of bees,

But when does life stay that still?

 

I’m on a sundial,

So I let the shadows move me

how they move me.

Once in a little while,

Coming through the summer grasses,

How time passes.

 

I don’t believe I knew how to love.

I only grew luscious fruit to wither.

Death in every variety

Was always on our green path.

 

I’m on a sundial,

So I let the shadows move me

how they move me.

Once in a little while,

Coming through the summer grasses,

How time passes.

 

Cut a moment open wide

In a fit of listlessness.

What a beautiful inside,

But the poison gets me to the point

I hardly notice.

 

I could unravel the stars at night,

But that would be such an empty pleasure.

It’s in the yawn of the yellow day

That you’ll forget all of me.

 

I’m on a sundial,

So I let the shadows move me

how they move me.

Once in a little while,

Coming through the summer grasses,

How time passes.

 

I’m on a sun,

I’m on a sun,

I’m on a sundial.

Night

 

 

Night—

Night—

 

While sitting at the table,

Mike and Mabel cut into their meat.

You’re mainly out of service,

Getting nervous watching others eat.

 

Maybe they won’t notice you’re uptight,

If you keep the conversation light.

Having trouble keeping down the night.

Night.

Having trouble keeping down the night.

 

Your mouth is understating,

Indicating that you don’t belong.

You’re going into hiding,

Subdividing when there’s something wrong.

 

Baby, only you can make it right.

Putting up a front or up a fight.

Smash another day into the night.

Night.

Having trouble keeping down the night.

 

Night—

Night—

Night—

 

Oh, how to live with the dark underside

In all the discomfort the shadows provide.

 

Your friends are double-jointed,

Disappointed walking to their car.

You know it’s so distressing,

Dispossessing who you really are.

 

Even when you’re moving toward the light,

You can sort of lose your appetite,

Throwing up the heavy dead of night.

Night.

 

Having trouble keeping down the night.

Having trouble keeping down the night.

Having trouble keeping down the night.

Time In the Tall Grass

LYRICS

 It’s All About the Rain

 

 

It’s all about the rain and how inclement weather

always makes me cry.

If only I could ride the shift of shadows

on the wide, wide-open sky.

 

Throwing down another sedative,

Help me cause I don’t know how to live.

 

It’s all about the sun and how it warms the blue mood

that comes over me.

Whenever I get tired of standing at the window

with a cup of tea.

 

Throwing down another sedative,

Help me cause I don’t know how to live.

Live—

 

Day and nightmares amplify the pounding on the roof.

In the fine print of a lie, they almost tell the truth,

And I’m not waterproof.

 

It’s all about the rain and how the wind blows all

those leaves in my backyard.

I’ll have to bundle up to carefully collect

the ones I should discard.

 

Throwing down another sedative,

Help me cause I don’t know how to live.

Live—Help me cause I don’t know how to live.y

 

 

 

Mad For You

 

 

All summer long, we were wrong,

And if wrong be made unsightly, put it rightly.

Tuck it to bed with its head through the windshield,

Family crested, house arrested.

 

All because we’re mad for you.

All because we’re mad for you.

 

Carting us off on a crutch and a cough,

While it’s outrageous, we’re contagious.

Weathermen say, by the way, there’s a slight

precipitation across the nation.

 

All because we’re mad for you.

All because we’re mad for you.

All because we’re mad for you, ooh, yeah!

All because we’re mad for—

 

You sitting inside out and over there

With the rain pouring in.

I’ll live a soggy life in love with you

Until God bless the end to begin!

End to begin—

 

Love isn’t fair; it is square.

And the sirloin heart is rounded where it’s pounded.

Some other meat may be sweet while we’re getting

Sympathism botulism.

 

All because we’re mad for you.

All because we’re mad for you.

All because we’re mad for you, ooh, yeah!

All because we’re mad for you—

 

Mad for you—Mad for you—

Mad for you— Mad for you—

 

You’re a Puzzle

 

 

By the way you put yourself together,

One might well conclude that you are two.

You may be in one piece, but you’re a puzzle

Whose pretty picture doesn’t look a bit like you.

 

Traveling with your old impedimenta,

Dragging that piano on crusade.

Miranda motor home cause you’re a puzzle

Who can’t decide which bit of Heaven to invade.

 

Underneath the sleeping bag the flat jack in the trunk.

Why should I help change a tire for such a nasty drunk?

All the way to Acre, riding on a micro spare,

Utterly deflated by this chivalrous affair.

 

Ranting up the rhetoric for Jesus,

But lately, when you genuflect and fall

You may be in one piece, but you’re a puzzle

who never knows as much as when she knows it all.

 

Who never knows as much as when she knows it all.

Who never knows as much as when she knows it all.

 

Time In the Tall Grass

That’s How You Know You’re Loved

 

 

 

Bells of Ireland, oh, but that we were

in our summer green.

There’s a loyal executioner

come to kiss his queen.

 

Some say this strange affection is a cut above.

That’s how you know, that’s how you know,

That’s how you know you’re loved.

 

Father told me they’d put up a fight

as a wedding gift.

Blood for justice doesn’t make it right,

It just makes it swift.

 

So take your hit of kindness

with a boxing glove.

That’s how you know, that’s how you know,

That’s how you know you’re loved.

 

It was bittersweet to cut the heart out of my shirt.

I miss the beat, ah, but now it doesn’t hurt.

 

Long division in the aftermath

where our nobles fell.

Are you crying just to make me laugh?
I can never tell.

 

Live, and life will desert you

when push comes to shove.

That’s how you know, that’s how you know,

That’s how you know you’re loved.

That’s how you know you’re loved.

 

LYRICS

Time In the Tall Grass

It’s Good To Be Going Home

 

 

I don’t know why you still ask me to take you for a ride

to all the places in the world, it isn’t safe to hide.

 

Cause when you’re out there, out there, out there,

It’s good to be going home.

Going home,

Going home.

It’s good to be going home.

Going home.

 

And if it is a war you want, then tally up the bill.

It’s gonna cost an awful lot to pay for your free will.

 

It may get lonely (lonely), lonely (lonely), lonely (lonely),

So it’s good to be going home.

Going Home,

Going home.

It’s good to be going home.

Going —

 

Home where at last, you’re at least half-aware,

there’s not a soul between you and thin air.

 

You’re desperate on the telephone, but what did you expect?

It’s all about the reaching out and then the disconnect.

 

And yes, lonely (lonely), lonely (lonely), lonely (lonely),

So it’s good to be going home.

Going Home,

Going home.

It’s good to be going home.

Going home.

 

It’s good to be going home.

Going Home,

Going home.

It’s good to be going home.

Going home.

 

Home—Home

Home—Home

Home—Home

Map Of the World

 

 

I know where I am,

Walking in Albert Street,

Back on my own two feet,

Falling in love again.

 

One pint over eight,

And I’ll be on my way.

Can’t fall down every day;

I’ve got to navigate.

 

But where on the map of the world do I go?

Where on the map of the world?

 

My degraded home,

It is in disrepair.

Though I am living there,

I’ve got an itch to roam.

  

But where on the map of the world do I go?

Where on the map of the world?

Where on the map of the world do I go?

Where on the map of the world?

 

The subtle currents—circumspect.

The continents that disconnect.

You love me with a strange neglect,

And yet, that is all that I expect.

That is all that I expect.

 

All things made of light,

Millions of particles,

I’ve read the articles,

Finding their way at night.

 

But where on the map of the world do I go?

Where on the map of the world?

Where on the map of the world do I go?

Where on the map of the world?

 

The continents that disconnect—

The continents that disconnect—

The continents that disconnect—

 

 

Dark

 

 

Simon made a game of our disappearing.

Simon, safe and sane, stood out in the clearing.

You don’t know how it feels—

You don’t know how it feels to lose your spark.

 

I’m burning myself out here.

I’m burning myself out.

Here comes the dark.

 

It was long before our association,

When every open door was under obligation.

You don’t know how it feels—

You don’t know how it feels to lose your spark.

 

I’m burning myself out here.

(You don’t know—)

I’m burning myself out.

Here comes the dark.

Here comes the dark.

 

I had dreams once; they flickered down low.

But they sure got rambunctious when they were let go.

 

I sat down to write something out of fashion.

But nothing could ignite a song already ashen.

You don’t know how it feels—

You don’t know how it feels to lose your spark.

 

I’m burning myself out here.

I’m burning myself out.

Here comes the dark.

Here comes the dark.

Here comes the dark.

 

 

 

Soft

 

 

World on a grey winter’s day,

With your serpentine scarf intact.

Tumbling misanthrope in my kaleidoscope,

Gone abstract.

 

The inside out of I love you,

A fractured reflection

when I am soft.

 

Back in our summer days,

Green, as a protégé’s disregard.

Hedging the hurt alone,

Something had overgrown our backyard.

 

The upside-down of I want you,

The length of forever

when I am soft.

 

How come when you say

you’ll never hurt me,

There’s a butterfly kiss on my skin,

And then you make me cry?

 

At the chrysanthemum,

We became overcome, then constringed.

Suffering old revolts,

Just as our overcoats came unhinged.

 

The inside out of I love you,

A shift in the hardware

when I am soft.