In the Age of Alienation (2019)

Full World

Is it not a wonder

Full world

Empty           

Circumstance

 

I wasn’t ready for this 

I wasn’t ready

I wasn’t ready for this


Lust and Divisions

Lust and divisions 

On dusty flags

Such lovely playgrounds

So many graves

 

We can’t make like it’s a victory

We can’t play like rubber man

We can’t see how far it goes…

This endgame … this endgame


We’re coming through the ages

We’re coming through the tempest

We’re coming through the age of alienation

We’re coming through…

 

We can’t make like it’s a victory

We can’t make play like rubber man

We can’t see how far it goes…

This endgame … this endgame

 

These luxuries, these luxuries

They’re dinosaurs, they have haunting appeal


Small Fires

Starting small fires

With whatever comes to mind

I’ve been collecting fuel wood

Some kindling

 

A sunny day drive against the countryside

Trembling through every cliché ever imagined

Dropping little pieces of paper along the way

A trap for the trappers to see and to run from

A photograph of ‘peace’ swept through the theatre of war

Sleeping, drinking in windows forever laughing

Intentions, investments, and insecurities

Against the tallest door in North America

 

Set aside an afternoon

An evening or two

We can decolonize our picnic

We can free the falls

 

I’m learning, I am learning, I am learning, I am learning … the ropes

I’m catching up, I’m catching on

 

But I’m keeping those notes

Yeah, I’m keeping those nonsense notes

Saying thank you 


Don’t Write 

Don’t write, don’t call it a fight 

I’m not leaving, I’m already gone

I’m already gone

 

Don’t write, just call it a night 

I’m not leaving, I’ve been gone for a long time

Gone for a long time

 

Words don’t write our colorful lines

We can’t make amends, we came to an end

Words don’t right our colorful lines

We can’t make amends, we came to an end

 

Please don’t write, because words don’t right


Pioneer Voices

Show up in the moonlight

The bandits we call our own

The smells and sounds of all of their vices

Have all become so familiar now

 

See their breath in the vanishing point

Oh, they come in a requiem

The children are all still awake

It’s autumn, but the commons are falling

 

The commons are falling

The commons are falling

The commons are falling

 

Resonate, resonate

Through the diamond field

 

The commons are falling

Can you hear their voices

The commons are falling

Carrying on through the years

The commons are falling

Can you hear their laughter

 

Resonate, resonate

Through the diamond field


Iris

In the iris of the servant

See the heir of this title

In the iris of the domestic

See the endless predecessor

 

Here pass this along

This crawling patchwork

A broken telephone

 

Don’t get upset, don’t get down

Don’t get upset, don’t get down

 

Maintain the rank, maintain the status

Shut up, just shut up, shut up

In the iris, in the iris, in the iris, in the iris


Wild Things

On the corner of silence

Into thin air at Woody Guthrie’s house

Unseeing, clearly vying

For better or for worse

The wild things


Let it be good riddance

At the lake of the harvest

Say goodbye to the Mrs

And climb on top of the setting sun

The wild things

 

Hit the trail out in the country

Set a fire if you’re lucky

Five hundred miles can’t stop us now

I can’t help it if I fall in love

The wild things

 

And then the locusts came, and they pulled out their guns

And then the locusts came, and they opened fire

And then the locusts came, and then they started the killing

And then the locusts came, and then they started the killing

 

They covered every single blade of grass

And they covered every lake, and river and stream

And they covered every ancient forest

And they covered every single mountain and piece of you and me

 

Walking the thin blue line…


Fragile Progress

This fragile this fragile progress

Gets earmarked for cutbacks

A glass box, a glass body

That we can both throw our stones at

 

Pretending we’re not worth the paper we’re written on

Pretending we’re not colonial

Pretending we’re not worth the paper we’re written on

Pretending we’re not …

 

The haunting appeal of the dinosaurs

The haunting appeal

 

So low…

 

The haunting appeal of the dinosaurs

The haunting appeal


Read Books

I never read those books on that shelf over there

But I never said I would, I’d only look

I never built this bridge over the water

But even if I did, then I would swim

 

Even when the water gets cold

Even when the rain turns to snow

I will not go

 

I never left my home with the curtains closed

Found lying in a pile of foolish gold

Like breath on a window and dabbled on signs

A house with no lawn, it’s covered in fog

 

Even when the water gets cold

Even when the rain turns to snow

Even when the snow to begins to ice

Even when the ice starts to melt

I will not go

 

And if it hurts too much to look away

Then just watch, and just wait


(c) 2019