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We are caged animals
We are caged animals
Ears flat, lip curled back
A blind attack waiting to happen
We are savage nemeses
We are holy warriors
Red-eyed, throat clutched tight
A ringside cheer in a dirty fight
We are brazen animals
We enrage our enemies
With rousing elegies
Forthright, head held high
Shining knight in a losing battle
We are noble meddlers
We are gory foreigners
Newborn, careworn
Shorthorns in uniform
We are a fearsome pedigree
(And now we have a reason to howl, bound together, muzzle to jowl
Blood is thicker than desire, and the tide is rising.) |
The imperfect is our paradise
Note that, in this bitterness, delight
Since the imperfect is so hot in us
Lies in flawed words and stubborn sounds
—Wallace Stevens, The Poems of Our Climate
Nothing more here
Flowers in a bowl
Snow outside the window
You here, in the hall
Searching for the ceiling
Nothing more here
Clean and snowy air
White flowers
Nothing more
Wheeling out to greet them:
One more for the road? One more for the road?
Still, one could want a little more
Still, one could need a little more
Still, one could want a little more
Still, one could need so much more
Nothing more here
Newly fallen snow
A simple bowl of flowers
Perfectly composed
Flawed words
Stubborn sounds
Searching for the ceiling
One more for the road?
One more? |
The vanishing point is on me. One blinking island—a light
In the darkness there’s a sign, the vanishing line is mine
I cannot reach tomorrow, see your face or breach your sorrow
There, in the corner of the sky, a waving hand takes flight
The vanishing point is on me
Clear the orchard, clear the rise
A line vanishing, a line vanishing
Clear the airport, clear the sky
A line vanishing, lines vanishing
Clear the table, close the door
Speak your name, step toward— |
If we can’t rely on one another, might as well climb down from the ledge and wait for sunrise, then try again tomorrow. Throw open that window wide. You won’t find us waiting here for sunrise to remind us. If we can’t rescue you, then what do we do? Turn out the light. Bring on the night. Turn up the sky. Turn it up
If we can’t believe in one another, might as well concede defeat and lock the shutters, wait for sunrise to cauterize our sorrow. Step back from the window. See the outline to your own redaction flanked by sunbeams. If we can’t rescue you, then what do we do? Turn out the light. Bring on the night. Turn up the sky. Turn it up. Let the bird sing |
My best friend, her name is Carmen
She likes me more than all those
Dirty rotten bastard kids
Ever did
Me and Carmen, we don’t need ‘em
Together we go arm in arm
Wherever we go
Me and Carmen
Every morning on the way to school
They torment us and call us names (they’re mean
And rude), but me and Carmen
We will show them
All night we are as free as owls
Flying high above the trees and houses
Hunting mice and squirrels
Together
When we’re twenty-three, me and Carmen
We’ll live in houses side by each with one big garden
And no one else
Just me and Carmen
There’ll be no one else, just me and Carmen
And the squirrels and the mice
And the houses and the garden
The trees and the other owls
But no one else
Just me and Carmen |
In memory of Faron Hall
The swimmer is gasping for shore
He has no more to say
Don’t chase him back under the bridge
Forgive his mistake
He saved those he could—
If you can, then you should. Carry on
By the banks of the river we belong
You are not alone. The world is your home
Everywhere you go, you’ll always ring clear to me
This current’s so desperate to feed
On our emptiness
Shopping carts running aground
In the muddy depths
Stung by the heat of our failure
Sink into place
The swimmer is swimming away
You are not alone. The world is your home
Everywhere you go, you’ll always ring clear to me |
Frail cocoon, don’t stir too soon, winter’s nearly over
An interior life is a superior life, the best that you can hope for
Don’t wrestle out, unfurl your wings and flutter out of sight
Those branches lie thick with webs to snare you in midflight
Moonlight, find me
Draw me from the deep
I long to be
Released
Leave the porch light on tonight, the moths will surely gather
Confused and frantic, wild and blind, forever ever after
Don’t wrestle out, unfurl your wings and flutter out of sight
The owls will swoop and pluck you straight out of the sky—
Moonlight, guide me
Keep me in your reach
I live to be
Complete
Frail cocoon don’t stir too soon, winter’s nearly over
An interior life is a superior life, the best that you can hope for |
A north wind sinks the fence around a lot full of debris
Near the corner of Memorial and me
Where resurrected brick and drywall leap back into place
Theres a terrified reflection of my face
All alone at the gleaming knife display in the Army Surplus Sales
As the dusk descends and my inspiration fails
And ghosts fill discount parkas, sleeping bags
Peer at me from the crumpled dark
Inky bruises punched into the sky by bolts of light
And then leak across the body of tonight
While rain and thunder drop and roll then stop short of a storm
Leave the air stuck with this waiting to be born
As I stand before an unresponsive automatic door
Just another door that wont open for me anymore
The exit red gets brighter, then blinks off
Presses me into the crumpled dark
Theres a billboard by the highway
But no sign to show you when you go away
And our demolitions punctuate
All we mean to save then leave too late
So Ill make my shaky exclamation mark
With a hand full of
The crumpled dark |
Everyone we leave behind, pennies tossed in fountains, the casual accumulations of our calcified desires. We breach in narrow pools of daylight, hulls shot through with wavelight. Wind sighing, hearts full sail, never dreaming we could fail
Waterfall, waterfall, who will heed your thunderous call?
This ever-changing rearrangement of prickling devotions, calving off and rising up from the glacial divide. Every crystalline persuasion hangs frozen for a moment, before our noisy clatter breaks the silence and its thrall
Waterfall, waterfall, who will heed your thunderous call?
Waterfall, waterfall, pouring out into the sea |
And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept, Untroubling and untroubled where I lie, The grass below; above, the vaulted sky. –John Clare, I Am!
Stamp out the fire, circle the plough. Comb through the ashes. Squint at the clouds. Mother, my daughter, sister and me, in a hurry. We’re seeds from a catalogue tossed in the mail, spilling from rental car, subway, and air. We sprout from the windows, grow through the stairs. We worry
Let me lie. Open up the door
Let me lie. Don’t need you no more
Untroubling, untroubled where I lie
Shake me awake when I slacken the reins. Sing to me sweetly past cornfields and trains. Trail on together, forever, forever. Circle our wagons. Gather in tight. Follow each other through darkness and night. Lift up our rifles, squeeze in between the hedges
Let me lie. Open up the door
Let me lie. Don’t need you no more
Untroubling, untroubled where I lie |
If I take the medication. If I lose my hair. If the slightest hesitation takes me anywhere, let it pour. Let it be forgotten
If you dare to wish me well and I disappear. If your reckless second-guesses drive me out of here, let me pour. Let me be forgotten
Crawl through the gaps in the curtains. Howl through the night. Sail down the hallway out of sight
If I offer up my body. If I dare to lose. I can take the shape of anything they want me to |
High-tops, flip flops
Three tall girls, school uniforms in blue
Yellow, green, multiplied, strangers
Underground
Out of focus, out of frame
Three tall girls, gum snapping, cut the line
Divided, multiplied, strangers
Underground
The day’s grown old, the fainting sun
They hold hands, make plans
Map the middle distances and yawn
Divisible by one, strangers
Underground
The day’s grown old, the fainting sun
The day’s grown old, the fainting sun |
The lyrics for this song have yet to be transcribed |
Originally Performed By: Propagandhi
Written By : Chris Hannah and John K. Sampson
Published By : Who Gives A Fuck? Productions |
If we never Met I´d be drunk waking up in someone else´s bed. I´d be lost in a crowed room with fake friends. I wouldn´t even know what love is. If we never me
What if I never started singing? What if you never told your family you were leaving? When you felt the pressure. Theirs a million different reasons we shouldn´t be together but when I put it all together It all comes back to you, you, you. I love it when the only light is me, you and the moon. And baby when I close my eyes I´m thinking about what What if we never met. I´d be drunk waking up in someone else´e bed. I´d be lost in a crowded room of fake friends. I wouldn´t even know what love is If we never met
What if I never left Nashville? What if you never called me back when I asked you?? Something stupid about the weather. it all happened for a reason cause you put me back together and when I put it all together it all comes back to you, you, you. I love it when the only light is me, you and the moon. And baby when I close my eyes I´m thinking about what if we never me. Id be drunk waking up in someone else´s bed. I´d be lost in a crowded room of fake friends. I wouldn´t even know what love is. If we never met |
How we dont know how to sing
I can barely play this thing
But you never seem to mind
When you tell me to fuck off
When I need somebody to
How you make me laugh so hard
How whole years refuse to stay
Where we told them to, bad dog
Locked up whining in a word
Or a misplaced souvenir
How the past chews on your shoes
And these memories lick my ear
I know
You might roll your eyes at this
But Im so
Glad that you exist
How we waste our precious time
Marching in the picket lines
That surround those striking hearts
And the time is never now
And we know who we should love
But were never certain how
I know
You might roll your eyes at this
But Im so
Glad that you exist |