Shield Your Eyes
----------------

There was a sun once.  It lit the whole
damn sky.  It kept everything alive.  And there was a man once.
he looked it straight in the eye.  He saw everything.  He went
blind.  The truth burns bright.  There's too much there
sometimes.  The sun it shows, the sun it blinds.  Best to keep
your eyes.  Stare at the sidewalk lines.  Let lies lie don't let
them shine.  The blind man staggers.  And he grabs at his eyes.
He can't to anything.  Everything is a lie.  Now he sits around.
And he stares at the walls.  He can't do anything at all.  Shield
your eyes from all this misery.

Big
---

In this ocean I'm a bag of tea.  I make some clouds but 
they're minor league.  Hack at the base of the largest tree.
Only to find that it doesn't bleed.  This is big.  The laughing right
stands before me naked, unashamed.  It's for your own good.
It's going to hurt us more than it hurts you.  Don't it make you
feel small?  You and yours on us and ours.  You've got the guns
and we've got the scars.  Turn the gun back on yourself.  I love
it when you thing big.


Chesterfield King
-----------------

We stood in your room and laughed out
loud.  Suddenly the laughter died and we were caught in an eye
to eye.  We sat on the floor and did we sit close.  I could smell
your thoughts and thought.  Do you want to touch a lot like me?
Too scared to say a thing.  I left your house and kicked myself.
I put those feelings on a shelf to die.  I guess I'm not a 
gambling type but think of what the two of us had lost.  I
needed some time to think it out.  7-Eleven parking lot.  A
toothless woman turned and stopped.  I gave her a dime and
a Chesterfield.  She leaned down and kissed my cheek.  I was
scared but it felt sweet.  Felt so sweet.  She asked me if I had
a name.  I told her I was glued up on some chick.  We sat and 
smoked against the wall.  Drank a beer felt the chill of fall.  I 
took my car and drove it down the hill by your house.  I drove
so fast.  The wind it couldn't cool me down, so I turned it around and came
back up.  You were waiting on your step, steam showing off your breath and
water in your eyes.  We pulled each other into one, parkas clinging on the
lawn and kissed right there.  Said all my chicks they smoke these things
and handed you a Chesterfield King.  Held your hand and watched tv and 
traced the little lines along your palm.

Sleep
-----
It seems I spend my days now wrapped in veils of sleep. Caught
in slumber's grasp, nowhere that I should be. I grew so goddamned tired
of fighting against these chains. No signs of relief or payment for my pains.
I know that I must try to break out of this cell I call my life. To go to sleep
is just to hide away. I close my eyes so I won't see the things I'd have to
try to get. I haven't tried I've only turned away. In my sleeping world I
thought that I was safe. Free from all the pain and burning light of day. But
even in my sleep now life is less than kind. No escaping from this madness
in my mind.  Severing.

Donatello
---------

When I come to life I'll suck the air so deep.  That will be my
first breath. I'm gonna cut my strings and kill the puppeteer. Then I'll walk
on out of here. I'll make sure nothing happens here. Follow all those
fingers pulling me. I've felt your hands shaping me all wrong ways. Stone
it warms to flesh now. They'll come from far and wide to see an empty
pedestal. I'm long gone. When it all comes down, I can show you
something you will not believe. When it all comes down, we're gonna see
a real masterpiece. With an artist's eye and a killer's touch. Takes a life
to make one. You had to get a grip, but I was caught inside of it. Sure you
made an impression. Depression.

Face Down
---------

Beneath the door I see a light. It's four a.m. in apartment
three. Muted sounds. A sealed room. I turn the knob. The door is gone.
Yellow light. Kitchen floor. An old woman is at the cutting board. Just her
back. Her old bent back. Short, abrupt chopping jerks. How do you like
that? I died in my sleep. Face down. Just a little dream I had. Face down.
It was more than real. Face down. She turns around. Smiles up at.
Laughing teeth into me. Silver gleam and out.

P.S. New York is Burning
------------------------

I leave it burning and count the dead. A jilted
lover, a one time friend. It reeks of incest. It reeks of pain. Erase my
anguish. Forget your name. Can't see the future. I just break free and run.
And knowing nothing I know that it's just begun. This day feels different.
Feels like shedding skin. My mind is clearer now I know what state I'm in.
And from a distance it seems so unreal. Nothing left. Nothing to feel. And
if it hurt you, it hurt me too. I had to kill it to heal the wound.

Like a Secret
-------------

Did you ever wish you could be king? Holding heaven in
your hands and hoping it will all come true. Turn the world on its ear make
it ring. Rub sticks in dirt and dust and let the bright come burning through.
Don't talk me down from here. Let me fly this kite without a string. Goes
much higher than these buildings. It is faster than your tv. Larger than your
life, like silver. Talk lines unbroken by old fears. Necklaces of perfect
words to hang around your perfect neck. Turn a diamond to a lump of coal.
Making fires amd melting ice. Locomotion frees the soul. Don't talk me 
down from here. Let me fly this kite without a string. Goes much higher
than these buildings. It is faster than your tv. Larger than your life,
like silver. Colder than deep water. It is better than a switchblade. Hides
mountains in its shadow like a secret. I make my bed alone. See the
would-be king on a would-be throne. I'm all I know now. Better get started.
It's a long walk home.

Tour Song
---------

Seven hundred miles to play to fifteen angry men. I need
some sleep. They hate the songs. We hate them too. This show is free.
Twenty minutes in broke another fucking string. Just call it luck. They start
to leave. I start to plead. Someone yells you suck. Suddenly that joe kicks
hard in my veins. I cool down. Things sound good right now. Suddenly fists
turn into brave ears, move as one. Funny how no one knows we came. They
wouldn't come anyway. Should I feel grateful to play. I'm living life my way.
I fell in love with my enemy. I let go of everything I had left at home. Two
cool people came. They're hiding by the door. Eyes wide with fright. A guy,
a girl, in love with the whole world. It almost makes it right. Every little
thing must go wrong.

You Don't Know What You Got ('til it's Gone)
--------------------------------------------

No words listed.  Just says, "Joan's words, so there."

Pack It Up
----------

And I'm asking what is left to do? And I'm feeling it's been 
done before. Referential, hey that's the guy from all those movies.
Referential, hey that's the riff from that old song. Don't play Busy,
Imaginary, Incomplete and Seethruskin, Drone and Gutless, Wound and 
Mean Guy. Equalized is overrated. Sorry.

Parabola
-------

I caught my eye in a swinging door. I'd never seen that man
before. I saw myself in someone else and hated them ever since. Some
broken glass and a bleeding hand. The mirror's down but I'm still standing.
Stand. I know who I am.

Bivouac
-------

I dug my fingers in the earth. I drew you pictures of my pain. They
were so pretty. They were so vain. Put your hands in the water. Let it touch
you everywhere. Boat of my father. Cut from my mother. Father. I'm lonely.
I'm an only. I learned to put on airs. I needed them to breathe. Today I wake
up, tell myself this is me. Now this is home. But the property's on loan.
So much for letting go. I'm picking up the phone. Bivouac.