I guess over time we became ducks I never seemed to see you much Then the world turned, time got away We fell out of touch I've been working at the airport bar It's like Christmas in a submarine Wings and brandy on a winter's night I guess you wouldn't call it a scene

When you're running for the door in the rain Read the metro section Read the metro section Read the metro section See my name

I suspect we could be losing now Please guard my bed Please guard my bed Please guard my bed Please guard my bed

Go contemplate the evidence and I guarantee you'll find The dead know what they're doing when they leave this world behind

They walk the alleys in duct tape shoes

And like a brown bird nesting in a Texaco sign I got a point of view

And when I couldn't count my friends on a single thumb I loved her to the maximum

Sleep on your back and ash in your shoes And always use the old sense of the words Your third drink will lead you astray Wandering down the backstreets of the world On the last day of your life, don't forget to die The things that you do will always make your mama cry

The morning will find us with a smile on our face And we'll be together in a lovers' embrace

They don't cry And they don't die in South Dakota, just like a seagull They don't mash They don't hatch in South Dakota In South Dakota Here comes the coda

They don't walk They don't talk in Malibu They don't vote They don't even smoke, I know you're blue I know you're blue I know you're blue They don't cream And they don't dream in Kansas City They don't cry They don't, they never act, I know you're ready

I am trying to get at something so simple that I have to talk plainly so the words don’t disfigure it.

Yeah, you look like someone Yeah, you look like someone who up and left me low Boy, you look like someone I used to know

Got a comb over cut circa Abscam sting Make a better Larry than Lizard King But you got to find a way to make it work 'Cause defeat is where your demons lurk

There is a house in New Orleans Not the one you've heard about, I'm talking about another house They spoke of gold in the cellar that a Spanish gentleman had left I broke in one hundred years ago with a dagger tucked in my vest

When you're seller and commodity You gotta sell yourself immodestly Turn your pedestal into a carving board If that's what the audience is starving for

The robot shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

I'm gonna shine out in the wild kindness

Open field with a window Open field with a window Open field with no child Open field with no child Open field Open field

Have no doubt about it, hon, the dead will do alright

Four dogs in the distance Each stands for a silence, yeah Bluebirds lodged in an evergreen altar I'm gonna shine out in the wild kindness I'm gonna shine out in the wild kindness I'm gonna shine out in the wild kindness And hold the world to its word

Moments can be monuments to you If your life is interesting and true It's just the same for a man or a girl The meaning of the world lies outside the world

Only one for me Only one for me Only one for me I'll put my dreams high on a shelf I'll have to learn to like myself Yeah, maybe I'm the only one for me

Ghosts are just old houses dreaming people in the night Have no doubt about it, hon, the dead will do alright Go contemplate the evidence and I guarantee you'll find The dead know what they're doing when they leave this world behind

Up the hill past 694, at the stone wall make a left And I will see you soon, my friend If these old directions still direct

Poor as a mouse every morning Rich as a cat every night

They don't vote They don't even smoke, I know you're blue

Of all of the people I knew I always looked up to you And after millions of years of crime The sun still shines and shines Look, a horse, of course Gallops through the desert light I make such good time through sub-space When I dream all day and write all night

I'm gonna shine out in the wild silence

Anchor lets you see the river move

Room games and diamond rain It's a fox hunt It's an F-stop It's a ten acre wood Outbound on a western train It costs a quarter, man Out on the border land I can dance real good Real good

That's one thing of which they're dang sure

All houses dream in blueprints Our houses dream so hard Outside, you can see my shoeprints I've been dreaming in your yard

You might as well say fuck me cause I'm gonna keep on Keep on loving you

There were no new ways to understand the world, only new days to set our understanding against.

"Hey, what Indian tribe occupied southern California? They were a lucky bunch of fellers!" Sting Bible, More Sea Bible, Knur & Spell In moments downhill, in moments downhill Towards sleep in the Stillwater shop Imagining places I was almost sure I'd never been

Smith and Jones forever!

I've been forced to watch my foes enjoy Ceaseless feasts of schadenfreude

The light of my life is going out tonight Without a flicker of regret

Inside the golden days of missing you With the people of Cleveland Who've suffered for so many years The shattered glass cussed And when it broke, it spoke to us It said, "Hey" It said, "I know you... what's your name? What's your name?"

Smith and Jones forever!

The elephants are so ashamed of their size Hosing them down, I tell 'em, "You got pretty eyes"

At the back of the bar, there's a couch Where the lonely people go and lie They talk to the honky tonk psychiatrist Into the wee hours of the night Into the wee hours of the night

I know a puppy who walked from Kentucky Made it to East Virginia by dawn He had seventeen ideas in his head

Mounting mileage on the dash Double darkness falling fast I keep stressing, pressing on Way deep down at some substratum Feels like something really wrong has happened And I confess I'm barely hanging on

Her doorbell plays a bar of Stephen Foster Her sister never left and look what it cost her We're gonna live in Nashville and I'll make a career Out of writing sad songs and gettin' paid by the tear

Well, there's trouble in the hall And trouble up the stairs And trouble in the trouble That's troubling the air Please don't say that my soul has died away

Birds of Virginia are flying within you Like background singers, they all come in threes

See the need to speed into the lead suddenly decline

Build a stage for Autumn's bitch They walk the alleys in duct tape shoes They see the things they need through the windows of a hatchback The alleys are the footnotes of the avenues