1. |
I feel air
06:12
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You should watch where your feet go
Count every heartbeat
Avoid the cracks now
Don’t bump those passers by
The trick is not to see
Keep your eyes down
Below the horizon
Divert your attention
Don’t look it in the eye
The trick is not to see
And on to the station
My hopes are on that train
But I move untethered
Like running in a dream
I feel air from another city drifting to me
It brings me memories so sweet I’d sooner they were gone
They just stand as indictments of me here in this place
Scenes so clear - turn my head away
I’d rather never see
Then rain falls cold
I laugh with my secret
My secret laughs right back at me
I look down - to the waterfront I follow the rain
Pulls me down - train is leaving soon, I’ll watch it go from there
I feel air from another city drifting to me
No such place - turn my head away, I’d rather never see
The sky’s dead weight
I walk with my secret
My secret walks right next to me
The truth I know
I close my eyes and laugh with my secret
My secret laughs right back at me
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2. |
Finisterre
04:59
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(After E. Montale)
Walking at noon, rapt and burnt
The crumbling paths and scorching dirt
The ocean all kinds of blue
Blackbirds and snakes on the bare peaks
Their tremolo screech from the hillside
Down below the beach is never low tide
Going along under a dazzling sun
To feel with sad wonder
How all of life will become this
Suspicions grow too easily here
Scavengers on the wing
Over surf, and over rock
And land’s end’s closing on in
We sit and watch the waves coming in
We sit and watch the waves coming closer
We sit and watch the waves coming closer in
We sit and watch the waves coming – land’s end’s closing on in
Bring the guitars with the rusted strings
Sit on the sand as some fool sings
Languid tales of eternal things
Gently rock while the tension sings
Bring the guitars with the rusted strings
Sit on the sand as some fool sings
Languid tales of eternal things
But I can hear a different clarinet that sings
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3. |
No struggle
04:44
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In my dream of a lonely world
All the people passed away
On this quiet earth turning
In this empty world mourning
I and only I remain
In my disaster vacation
There is no desperate struggle
No cities are burning
There’s no dystopia coming
I and only I remain
I will inherit all the earth
All your worldly possessions are mine
In my cosy catastrophe
My mind slowly atrophies
I and only I remain
I remain but the earth abides
The novelty wanes but I’m in a fix
There’s no reason to go on
When the last man has no one
I and only I remain
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4. |
If we met today
04:56
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I was a fool, I wasn’t wise
Never told the truth – though it’s true I never told you lies
Walked away from a good thing
Like I knew what I was doing
Took me til now to realise just what I ruined
Oh darling, I stare at the models on the billboards that look like you
My heart quickens at someone dressed in the bright colours you’d choose
I catch my reflection with shame in my heart
How far I’ve slipped from life since we broke apart
Now you’d see me as I am
If we met today for the first time
The thought makes me want to cry
If you met me today for the first time
I deleted your number, moved your things out of sight
Did all the stuff you do when you’re doing things right
Then I find myself using phrases that you used to
At home I’m hanging pictures of the kind that would appeal to you
Lying on my sofa on a slow afternoon
Wisihing I could re-take those conversations I ended too soon
I think of how I live now with shame in my heart
How far I’ve slipped from life since we broke apart
Now you’d see me as I am
If we met today for the first time
The thought makes me want to cry
If you met me today for the first time
You’d smile right past me now
If you met me today for the first time
Cos now you know your worth
And darling, I’ve learned mine
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5. |
Wendy & Lisa
03:33
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Listening in the back seat
Window wiper sounds like
fingers on guitar strings
The patterns of the rain
Wonder why it falls
Like that
Those were sad times
It can't have just been me
When the car would idle
I'd be disengaged
We'd all look out our windows
Our individual pains
But the sound of the music
Made it through the the space
The heavy air, the warp
At the end of side A
A million miles away
And somewhere in the future
There’d be girls like Wendy and Lisa
That you could hope to get with
Maybe, one day, "good to meet ya!"
And they might introduce you
Help you pick out clothes that suit you
A million miles away
And in a future life
Far from family cars
Quietly in neutral
the silent isolation
Emotionless relations
A family like a stopped clock
In a house that held its breath
Pulled you in like smoke and
Wrapped you up in fog
Made your heart so tired
The only thing you liked was
Staring out the window at the
Patterns of the rain
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6. |
Morning sunshine
04:23
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Morning sunshine breaks through the blind
The land of calm in the morning time
Leaning on a doorframe looking outside
Seasonal weather’s the only surprise
If you look right at them, thoughts are elusive
Melt like candy floss – inconclusive
If you look right at them, thoughts are elusive
Melt like snowflakes – inconclusive
Leaning on a doorframe, looking outside
Another bare tree sky catches your eye.
This autumn sunset looks like a fake still
Stolen from a cut scene in a crap film
If you look right at them, thoughts are elusive
Melt like snowflakes – inconclusive
If you look right at them, thoughts are elusive
Melt like candy floss – inconclusive
Still trying to figure out this same thought
So far no good, you come up with nought
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7. |
Still life
03:03
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That way is just what it is
Can’t hear the same song twice
These daft fantasies of life
After your epiphany
There’s still the dishes and the laundry
Then you find yourself there again
Cooking up something for a friend
Making up for a small still life
And that other thing that I miss
Sunday afternoon domestic bliss
But what if the thing that you miss
Much more beyond just a kiss?
Nothing to do with something lived
Missing a frame of mind I used to have
That way is just what it is
Can’t hear the same song twice
These daft fantasies of life
After your epiphany
There’s still the dishes and the laundry
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8. |
Future
05:54
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The future was going
By degrees eroding
The flower of an instant
Brought it back
For a while
Brought it back
Everyone stands alone at the heart of the earth
Traversed by a ray of the sun
Suddenly evening is come
When you tied back your dark hair
Smiled like I could be your lover
By the lake at the courtyard
You brought me back
For a while
The work of a moment
The possible ways to move things
The warmth of the evening
Brought it back
For a while
Brought it back
Everyone stands alone at the heart of the earth
Traversed by a ray of the sun
Suddenly evening is come
The future was going
By degrees eroding
The flower of an instant
Brought it back
For a while
Brought it back
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9. |
From my window
06:05
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I play a game from my window
Of picturing who I’d like to see
Walk by the street below me
More and more it surprises me
It’s not him, it’s not her – it’s none of them at all
It’s not even the kind of street I’d have thought I’d be living in at all
Half dressed, the dregs of the morning
Empty cup and a passing thought:
Every change, there’s a cost
Something gained, something lost
I push the window open wide, catch the sounds on the air
It’s weekends and warmer months and summer rain and smoke from elsewhere
It’s just the morning dying
At other times in the morning
When the night would carry through
Lazy hugs, ragged voices
Watching rainclouds black and blue
But memories at the best of times are only half true
There’s a voice in my head these days, I’m glad to say it’s new
It’s just the morning dying
The evening’s coming through
Tired thoughts, jagged voices
Rainstorm passing through
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