Iron & Wine

You returned the book unfinished about a girl with raven hair And a gentleman, her lover, who presented her a mare Which she rode across the country, leaving him to tend the land Which had turned to drier quarter when it met his lonely hands No more weeds...

And if I died at twenty-three Would you bury me in the sunshine? Please let me know that you're still mine Though I'm gone My love for you is oh-so strong And when the grass grows over me Let me know you still love me Never put nobody else above me Th...

Maybe I didn't love you Quite as often as I could have Maybe I didn't treat you Quite as good as I could have Little things I should have said and done I just never took the time You were always on my mind You were always on my mind Maybe I didn't hold you A...

who left you so? striking a match for the keyhole dark as the evening laid when he left you all alone turning to fade through the sawgrass tall as the only love that you'll ever really know who left you so? grace is a gift for the fallen, dear you're an an...

Mr. Henry and the muscle man Gave her shoes on a night there was no room to stand And like a letter in a stolen purse She was bored of her weight, she was bored of her words The daughter of a soldier told the fallen priest "It's a cold, cold place in the...

Reading letters Ancient coins And pockets full of earth Chance I'll see you Next December Bathtub running Joining hands And naked as a bird That's a vision I'll remember Pull the covers of the bed The papers of the ground Now a baby W...

Sunday morning, my Rebecca sleeping in with me again There's a kid outside the church kicking a can When the cedar branches twist she turns her collar to the wind The weather can close the world within its hand And my mother says Rebecca is as stubborn as the...

Let's go out and dance, darling our last of days and grace the game with a blindfold on the cheaters came to play and outside the soft-handed boys screaming cars and all their speed music, meth, a hero beggin change his sword across his knees and how...

Two flat tires on the Model T Two birds fighting for a bug Faded squares like snowy TV screens Where your photographs were hung Keep Old Glory folded on a shelf In a cabinet full of guns Sell that engine block to someone else Maybe they can make it run...

When the arrogant goddess of love came to steal my shoes She had a white-hot pistol and a noname hard tattoo Saying one's to give And one's to take away But neither of them will keep you off your knees The children bowed and bolted off the stage While th...

tell me, baby, tell me are you still on the stoop watching the windows close? i've not seen you lately on the street by the beach or places we used to go i've a picture of you on our favorite day by the seaside there's a bird stealing bread that i brought out...

Our missing pieces walk between us When we were moving through the door You called 'em mine, I called 'em yours You make me get so angry And I'd stay there on my own We both make peace but all alone Some call it talking blues (talking blues) Some call...

Boy with a coin he found in the weeds with bullets and pages of trade magazines close to a car THAT flipped on the turn when God left the ground to circle the world Hey...Oh... Girl with a bird she found in the snow that flew up her gown, and that's how she...

Stepping gently down the garden row Susie she prays but yet nothing grows Empty driveway and a flagpole tap Breeze at her back & her hands in her lap Susie says she'd like to talk Sinking sunshine past his bedtime He says, "Talk of what?" Mother pas...

[Verse 1] Say it's here where our pieces fall in place Any rain softly kisses us on the face Anywhere means we're running We can sleep and see 'em coming Where we drift and call it dreaming We can weep and call it singing [Verse 2] Where we pray when...

Call your boys, now that the table is set and shining, no one's seen, them in many days, Call your boys, they shot a buzzard off a Chrysler, and you still taste, all that you swallowed before grace, and you'll forgive, even the time they burned the hen hou...

There's a rooster, a hen, a black dog By my kid in the yard And I've tattooed the head Of the woman I've wed on my arm We sit on the lawn And she winks and she yawns At the sound that the setting sun makes As it lights up the lake and goes down And y...

Is there a race involved? You run and hide, you get two stars Last night two fat skinheads whistled at her But she sleeps it off A whiskey scent on her kitten's fur And when it's time to go I'll push her high as she wants to go Red pants down, she's pi...

Almost home When I missed the bottom stair You were braiding your gray hair It had grown so long Since I'd been gone And the perfect girls, By the pool, they would protest The cross around their necks, But our sons were overseas, And we all know 'bout the hiv...

The kettle burned cause I left it too long and we were kissing with the radio on the cat was choking on a rattle snake bone the town had gathered round the soldier boy carried home---- ca-----rried home---- The sick kids ate up all the red clay and eve...

Warm in the jailhouse in Brownsville, asleep, A bootful of liquor he borrowed. He dreamed he was colored and waiting to meet The rich man drawing tomorrow. Head full of cotton, the scent in his mouth, White coat of paint on the steeple. Sharp pins and n...

The back alley's full of rain And everything's shining As holy as she can be The trick’s in the timing Free as the morning birds Fragile as china She’s stuck in the weakest heart Of South Carolina Where all of the naked boys who lay down beside her...

I remember you well in the Chelsea Hotel You were talking so brave and so smooth Giving me head on the unmade bed While the limousine waits in the street And those were the reasons and that was New York We were running for the money and the flesh That wa...

Give me your hand The dog in the garden row is covered in mud And dragging your mother’s clothes Cinder and smoke The snake in the basement Found the juniper shade The farmhouse is burning down Give me your hand And take what you will tonight, I'll give it as...

Our winter keeps running us down We wake up with love hanging on Killers let go, killers let go Some kids get handful of rain Our hope is the desperate die wise Killers let go, killers let go Morning falls from a tree and asks for a name Claim your gh...

Magazines and paperbacks, the perfect rainy day Jenny's packed the car by now and probably on her way Rise and put the kettle on, this feeling calls for tea Tommy get the telephone, it wouldn't be for me Spring feels so far away when you're unforgiven Now...

Talk of yesterday and She will show her Brothers photographed In callous clothes. Say tomorrow and She'll say come find me On a beach, and there will no moon. But say today, and she will kiss your face And maybe forget. Talk of yesterday like bargain...

Hello, cowgirl in the sand Is this place at your command? Can I stay here for a while Can I see your sweet, sweet smile Old enough now to change your name When so many love you, is it the same? It's the woman in you That makes you want to play this game Hello,...

Oh, the gentlemen are talking and the midnight moon is on the riverside They're drinking up and walking and it is time for me to slide I live in another world where life and death are memorized Where the earth is strung with lover's pearls and all I see are...

Give this stone to my brother Cuz we found it playing in the barnyard Many years ago Give this bone to my father He'll remember hunting in the hills When I was 10 years old May my love reach you all I locked in myself and buried it too long Now that...

To my dearest forsaken Who the earth now has taken Empty, the bottle drains no more It is true that I loved you Despite the harm that I own you Wash out the river has you boy Here on the eve of too long Where you'll think I've done wrong Waking in fe...

Though our fathers' fathers slept in stolen houses All that's over now And our babies never cry And we can look you in the eye And say, "We're not afraid to die" And yes, our mothers' mothers saw in black and white But all that's over now And our child...

Will you say when I'm gone away "My lover came to me and we'd lay In rooms unfamiliar but until now" Oh, oh, oh, oh until now, Oh oh oh oh until now, oh. Will you say to them when I'm gone "I loved your son for his sturdy arms We both learned to cradle than...

hey man evening on the ground and there is no one else around so you will blame me blame me for the rocks and baby bones and broken lock on our garden garden wall of eden full of spiderbites and all your lovers we were we were born to fuck each o...

They heard a car sputter away too soon Me and the boys from the billiards room Found a shady tree Halfway home and going nowhere Casey was asked for his favorite joke Fluttered away just before he spoke But he came to me Halfway home and going nowhere...

daddy's ghost behind you sleeping dog beside you you're a poem of mystery you're the prayer inside me spoken words like moonlight you're the voice that i like needlework & seedlings in the way you're walking to me from the timbers faded from the winter...

Some days her shape in the doorway Will speak to me A bird’s wing on the window Sometimes I’ll hear her when she’s sleeping Her fever dream A language on her face I want your flowers like babies want God’s love Or maybe as sure as tomorrow will come Some day...

A fistful of roses ain't the best thing I could do I called by the clothesline and the fish pond, called out for you You want an urgent, bent-guitar string kind of man And you built a bridge now for to find him, if you can And Betsy, I see you now that you...

I was a quick wet boy, diving too deep for coins All of your straight blind eyes wide on my plastic toys Then when the cops closed the fair, I cut my long baby hair Stole me a dog-eared map and called for you everywhere Have I found you Flightless bird,...

Awake through the night, and this flood water 'round her Reminds her of the time And low country boys, and their bottles without her Though she's on their minds Hands in black mud, at the foot of the manger She'll always be young And free to be wrong A...

Run to the newsstand, boy, For a paper. Here's the change you will owe. Pass all the smoking girls And their babies Where they nurse in the road. And read me, read What has taken place. And we might see Sporting races fruitful today. Run to the new...

Someday soon I'll just live over yonder Bring you coffee to taste Crossword puzzles to ponder And I hope you're well And you know that I love you Though I write so seldom And call every blue moon There's some tall Georgia boy Searching out a freckled...

When the men take me to the devil tree I will be free and shining like before Papa don’t tell me what I should’ve done She’s the one, She's the one who begged me "Take me . . . Take me home" When the wind wraps me like the reaper’s hand I will swing fre...

Mary, carry your babe Bound up tight like lips around a whimper Your fingers over my face Blind eyed Samson driven to the temple And night birds digging 'til dawn Freedom hangs like heaven over everyone Ain't nobody knows what a newborn holds But his ma...

Dreamless sleep will fall like a deep, poisoned well On the steeple birds and this red-light hotel So lay your pistol down, Granny The company men never came to you But don't unknit your brow, Granny The mice in the yard ate the potted plants you grew...

I've become a glad man singing a song About a soldier on a good and a fallen angel Naked as a fish and a high About a sad man climbed up a willow bough And the cops are on the fence around a dog in the manger And the mouth of the river is wide Wide......

She belongs back in western Kentucky Or maybe somewhere in Tennessee Far from home there's a way to her body Though she's wind-blown and slightly Long ago there were plums on the table Where momma smoked in the afternoon The guilty played half-asleep in...

God made the automobile To pass all the pretty girls That smoke by the side of the road Their blues lovin' boys in tow To drive until the of the day And bow to a borrowed flag Beside all the brave and the blind And men without men in mind To pass all...

Godless brother in love you might as well lay down that rose and fold the flag She is money and tabs that broken freedom in See her big children burning rags by the riverside You can hear them on the hilltop laughing, cursing every bird in the air...

But it all came down to you and I But it all came down to you and I There were banged up hands[?] stealing first base underneath the tables so we never sang grace falling out of bed for the workday week there was kissing in the cracks of the flash flood stree...

We found each other blown between the trees Waning moons wanting to be swallowed by the sea Like we finally saw the colors of the world We grew the garden snake within the weeds Laid each other long across a flat backstreet Like we finally saw the colors of t...

brave lady, i could see you through the mosses laid, shameless in the sun my lady with her porcelain and her weightless face, pleasing everyone gray stables and the horses of the righteous pray daily for the brave lady, you were gorgeous in your we...

Halfway home in the hilltop trees And all our footprints in the snow And the evening glow, leaving Low night noise in the winter time I wake besides you on the floor Counting your breathing I can't see nothing in this half moon Lay me down if I should...

Doo doo doo I'll make supper for myself. I'll watch the clock upon the shelf. I'll clean this broken house you denied. Is your time much better spent By giving such a small percent To every pleasantry that I tried? What's the ugly thing I see? When w...

One more drink tonight as your gray stallion rests Where he lays in the reins For all of the speed and the strength he gave One more kiss tonight from some tall stable girl She’s like grace from the earth When you’re all tuckered out and tame One more tired...

and come the evening of my day the dark birds in the tree and in her garden I think I'll be there somewhere too the yarrow by my head where are you fallin' and she will lick her thinner thumb and ringless finger too and douse a candle and though sh...

He kissed her once as she leaned on the windowsill She'll never love him but knows that her father will Her fallen fruit is all rotten in the middle but her Breast never dries when he's hungry The money came and she died in her rocking chair The window w...

Louise only got from me innocent poetry Although she played to not listen But still I can hear myself speak as if no one else Ever could offer the same Some say she knowingly tasts like a recipe Although so foolish and willing I said Babe I can picture...

Homeward, the new road meanders, Washed out the old road as to what did I bring, Flowers, a verse about springtime, Perchance in the treeline, she's waiting for me. Homeward, these shoes worn to paper, Thin as the reason I left here so young, Homeward,...

There is a house by the sea Two jealous sisters, they're waiting for me And one is laid on the floor And one is changing the locks on the doors And I've been buying the time on my knees And I've been selling their blankets to bleed (on) Around the house by th...

there is light in my lady's house and there's none but some falling rain this like a spoken word she is more than her thousand names no hands are half as gentle or firm as they like to be thank God you see me the way you do strange as you are to me it is goo...

Cain got a milk-eyed mule from the auction Abel got a telephone And even the last of the blue-eyed babies know That the burning man is the color of the end of day And how every tongue that gets bit always has another word to say Cain bought a blade from some...

You're sweet like a honey bee But like a honey bee stings You've gone and left my heart in pain All you left is our favourite song The one we danced to all night long It used to bring sweet memories Of a tender love that used to be Now it's the same ol...

Jesus the Mexican boy born in a truck on the fourth of July gave me a card with a lady naked on the back Barefoot at night on the road Fireworks blooming above in the sky I never knew I was given the best one from the deck He never wanted nothing I remember M...

Who's seen jezebel? She was born to be the woman i would know And hold like the breeze Half as tight as both our eyes closed Who's seen jezebel? She went walking where the cedars line the road Her blouse on the ground Where the dogs were hungry, roamin...

John don't see well in the evenings Because of his one glass eye That he got just as Martha was leaving Shot him instead of saying goodbye Though the door took the brunt of the buckshot It scattered on the right of his face He was blind to the traveling...

Deep inside the heart of this troubled man There's an itty bitty boy tuggin' hard at your hand Born bitter as a lemon but you must understand That you are bringin' me Joy I only lie when they don't want the truth I'm only frightened cuz you finally gi...

Day walks out and there's no sound There's a candle burning by me now Light enough for to see the things beyond me Door is wide as a rise on me So the night comes in and starts to breath The only name that I really know Tell me did he think of me At a...

Jenny was gone And the moon blooms All shining As we dragged our panic Up and down the riverbed Sweating wild and weird In our Sunday clothes Jenny was gone Though I thought that I knew her And the rain came howling Out of Virginia Blue tick blowing the water...

run like a race for family when you hear like you're alone the rusty gears of morning and faceless, busy phones we gladly run in circles but the shape we meant to make is gone and love is a tired symphony you hum when you're awake and love is a crying baby ma...

Look at the shadow on our tree Seems we'll meet an early dusk Loretta looked up, the grey sky low Two-by-two on the bus Water and anger in our house Though she spoke of rainbows Reaching the roof with soaking shoes River's up, where'd she go? You're...

Darling behave, though your boy is gone, or so we’ve heard I feel you would rise if it was a song who’d say these words Summer comes with its color all to take your breath away Winter turns all the summer’s love to grey Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh Ah, ah, ah, ah...

Love is a dress that you made long to hide your knees love to say this to your face, "I'll love you only" for your days and excitement, what will you keep for to wear? someday drawing you different, may I be weaved in your hair? Love and some verses y...

I've seen her as she wakes up in the morning She reaches out a hand without a word As her fingers softly fall upon my face She lights the flame of desire and makes me want her And love is the foundation we lean on All you need is love to ease your mind...

Oh, I've just come from the land of the sun From a war that must be won in the name of truth With our soldiers so brave, your freedom we will save With our rifles and grenades and some help from God I want to see my family My wife and child are waiting f...

Walk on lightly far from sorrow Walk and meet me, we'll meet tomorrow Watch me growing, watch me dying Hear my laughing, my hound a-crying Ah-ooh, ah-ooh, ah-ooh, ah-ooh Walk on lightly, live what you do While you're walking I'll be beside you Watch you...

I came to you, and you to me. And we were tapping on the window at the children when the piggy bank broke. And pitching quite a fit, About how the makers of the medicine will always say you’re looking sick. I came to you, and you to me. And we would whi...

In the failing light of the afternoon Lucy in the shade of the dogwood blooms Yesterday the solace of a poison fish Tomorrow I'll be kissing on her blood red lips No one is the saviour they would like to be The lovesong of the buzzard in the dogwood tree With...

He's in a white car waiting for the light to change He's a buddy of mine but I can't complain He can make a lot of money, he can touch his toes He knows you never look til the lights are low And I love you and you love me So we never demand and we never agree...

Me and Lazarus, we shovel all the ashes out Black bare linens blowing 'round Back and forth and up and down oh oh woah, guess I had nowhere else to go Me and Lazarus kept bailing on the riverboat Floating by the choir rose Bobbing in the ebb and flow o...

Say, say something nice to her Fragrant and sturdier Delicate hands for shoulders sliding down Days, days like a summer rain Blink and they’re gone again Soaking she sits alone, outside and down Prays, prays for a soldier boy In fire and angry noise Under the...

I knew you well, I know you best A baby mouth and I the breast A lazy bone, an eagle eye Circling a city that's higher than the sky And it's looking like you better do what they say Those monkeys uptown, I told you not to fuck around Heaven's the name a...

hard light take the wings of the winter soft bird they were strong hands that held her miles above ground we can't see you now morning took the reins from the rider strong hands on the lap behind her tear her nightgown we can't see you now 

Mothers of the rodeo Like anyone who's watched a lover go And their blood thrown down Torn and tossed around Baby, say you'll stay with me We'll build a bridge across it carefully Just let them lie, don't throw At least our river goes Do, do, do, do ....

Well , hello Mr. Soul, I dropped by to pick up a reason For the thought that I caught that my head is the event of the season Why in crowds just a trace of my face could seem so pleasin' I'll cop out to the change, but a stranger is putting the tease on I was...

found your name across the chapel door carved in cursive with a table fork muddy hymnals and some bootmarks where you'd been the shaking preacher told the captain's man the righteous suffer in a fallen land and pulled the shade to keep the crowd from peeking...

There is light in my lady's house And there's none but some falling rain This like a spoken word She is more than her thousand names No hands are half as gentle Or firm as they like to be Thank God you see me the way you do Strange as you are to me I...

She says, "Wake up, it's no use pretending" I'll keep still and breathe in her. Birds are leaving over autumn's ending One of us will die inside these arms Eyes wide open, naked as we came One will spread our ashes round the yard She says, "If i leave b...

Black dog bit through the keeper's chain Small and angry when the Devil came Sold my soul like a pocket knife There was no moon, there'll be no milk as sweet Tomcat curled on a rabbit cage Brittle fingers in the potter's clay Sold my soul and I laid her...

God, there is gold hidden deep in the ground God, there’s a hangman that wants to come around How we rise when we’re born like the ravens in the corn on their wings, on our knees crawling careless from the sea God, give us love in the time that we have...

Love was a promise made of smoke In a frozen copse of trees A bone cold and older than our bodies Slowly floating in the sea Every morning there were planes The shiny blades of pagan angels in our father's sky Every evening I would watch her hold the pillow T...

There are times that walk from you like some passing afternoon Summer warmed the open window of her honeymoon And she chose a yard to burn but the ground remembers her Wooden spoons, her children stir her Bougainvillea blooms There are things that drift a...

Here’s a prayer for the body buried by the interstate Mother of a soldier, a tree in a forest up in flames Black valley, peace beneath the city Where the women hear the washboard rhythm in their bosom when they say "Give me good legs and a Japanese car and sho...

Curiosity far greater than the fear It felt so simple, so prodigious, at the same time Incredible things are happening in the world Magical things are happening in the world Across the river there are all kinds of magical instruments While we really kee...

You're a raven on a tractor wheel They don't feel the world the way you feel, no You spread your wings like a phoenix, girl Burnin' out like a song you heard and forgotten since 

When I was young, younger than before I never saw the truth hanging from the door And now I'm older, see it face to face And now I'm older, got to get up clean the place And I was greener, greener than the hill Where flowers grew and the sun shone still...

This postcard tells you where we've been And dirty dreams of pious men Who wake in fear but sleep again With what they've done With what they've done With all they've done Some profit died but wrote it down Our serpent bell is on the ground And all t...

There’s a prison on Route 41 Home to my father, first cousin, and son And I visit every weekend Not with my body but with prayers that I send I’ve a reason for my absentee And no lack of love for my dear family And my savior is not Christ the Lord But...

lately she don't care for a warmer breeze or shade around the base of the maple trees spring was on the mountain we climbed upon stopped to see how high and how far we'd gone i said, 'love is waiting and better days' she smiled and placed a kiss on my waiting...

time & all you gave i was the jerk who preferred the sea to tussling in the waves tugging your skirt, singing please, please, please but now i see love tracked on the floor where you walked outside now i seek love looking for you in this other girl's eyes...

Like the setting sun And more than anyone You look warmer when you're sinking down Find your favourite tree And come sit next to me I've a sheet that's softer than the ground This time spent with you Feels like charcoal sketches for a painting That y...

Last I saw mother she rose from a chair When they caught me I'd just finished combing my hair 'Cause a rabbit will rose, as a colt does along with the mare We've all learned the earth while we carried the throne We dove under the rivers and under our cloth...

Did the wine make her dream Of the far distant spring Or a bed full of hens Or the ghost of a friend All the while that she wept She had a gun by her bed And a letter he wrote From a dry, foundered boat And the train track will take All the wounded...

A skull and a jewel on a wooden cane A rattling bone on a boat, on the waves you sail away I will lay awake ‘til all your power’s gone Whippin’ the pig ‘til it broke the gate A table and chair by the creek though his house was washed away I will lay awak...

Dust gets red, and red dust plays On the wind near Daniel's place Danny's sick and smaller boy Rhythm lingers on and on On and on, on and on Dust gets dead the sun gone down Danny's boy lies in the ground Guitar on the dead boy's chest Devil's grantin...

In our days we will live like our ghosts will live pitching glass at the cornfield crows and folding clothes like stubborn boys across the road, we’ll keep everything Grandma’s gun and the black bear claw that took her dog And when sister Lowery says “Amen,” w...

There's no way to temper your thirst With lasting impressions or pictures of home There's no way to grow that don't hurt She growled from the station then hung up the phone There's no sacred vision like her No eye-crushing mountain or jewelry to wear Th...

Jane sent her hand and then pulled it away. She said, "Here's the alternate proof that I love you. Two magic children that smile at your name, A body that pulls like a pack mule to meet you. Tell me, dear Robert, what turns you to town, Turns you to empt...

Tonight, we're the sea and the salty breeze the milk from your breast is on my lips and lovelier words from your mouth to me when salty my sweat and fingertips Our hands they seek the end of afternoon My hands believe and move over you Tonight, we're t...

There's a woman here with a broken record player And a dusty compass off to map the country's new behavior Strange words that we hold on back into the river Brave boys in the empty coats of men There's a kitchen timer, distractions and reminders That the...

Give me your shoulder, I'm a sing song bird My savior says that I'm the words I map across a daylight blinding you Chicken-boned and with a 10-cent bunk Claimed Jesus spoke, though I was drunk Untied my shoe and told me what to do: "Warn the boys are a...

When we all ran back into the briars We told our children about the foreign shore When we threw our boots into the fire We told them all about the tug of war Gonna tell them about the seed and the shovel About the prison and the promised land Gonna tell them...

Midnight, and her eyes Hide like kittens, new and wet Mine are sinning hands On her lying on my bed The river still may rise Wild and water take us both Mine are sinning hands Take our bodies, take our clothes Bloodless moonlight, may my lady Give h...

Beyond the ridge to the left, you asked me what I want Between the trees and cicadas singing around the pond "I spent an hour with you, should I want anything else?" One grinning wink like the neon on a liquor store We were sixteen, maybe less, maybe a li...

Somehow when you laid here by my side Somethin' whispered words like rain is falling Heavy, and she hated, loved to fight Someone from the sun-cracked sidewalk calling out, "Yoo-hoo" Hey, uh huh Sometime I may trade this bone-tired fist Somewhere I'll...

Lost my watch, watch and chain But time's not lost This time we walk together beside the slow black river Water-walking over mud You whisper something Something good in my ear So I stop so I can hear: "Darling, I'm the one to blame I threw your watc...

Ah-ha, smokestack lightnin' Shinin' just like gold Why don't you hear me cryin'? Whoo-hoo, whoo-hoo Ah-ha, tell me, baby What's the matter with you? Why don't you hear me cryin'? Whoo-hoo, whoo-hoo La dah, da da da da la dah Whoa-oh, tell me, baby...

papa died smiling, wide as the ring of a bell gone all star white, small as a wish in a well and sodom, south georgia woke like a tree full of bees buried in christmas bows and a blanket of weeds papa died sunday and i understood all dead white boys say...

Waking before you I've got a fever and a childish wish for snow Seems like a long, long time Since I spun you to this borrowed radio You pick a place that's where I'll be Time like your cheek has turned for me Someday the waves will stop Every aching ol...

just like the way that you ran to wine when they made the new milk turn Jesus, a friend in the better times let your mother's bible burn freedom, a fever you suffered through and the dog drank from your cup frozen, the river that baptized you and the horse die...

I am thinking it's a sign That the freckles in our eyes Are mirror images and When we kiss they're perfectly aligned And I have to speculate That God himself did make us into Corresponding shapes like puzzles pieces From the clay True, it may seem like a str...

Be this sunset soon forgotten Your brothers left here shaved and crazy We’ve learned to hide our bottles in the well And what's worth keeping, sun still sinking Down and down Once again Down and down Gone again Be this sunset one for keeping This jun...

"Take me again," she said, thinking of him "To the pond with the swans and the swimming" Far from his room the familiar perfume How it felt to her when she was naked Lessons she learned when her memory slurs As they marvel with love at the sunset Walking...

And when you give me your clothes And when we’re lovers at last Fresh air, perfume in your nose There will be teeth in the grass And when you give me your house When we’re all brothers at last There will be food in our mouths There will be teeth in the...

It's New Year's Eve And California's gonna kill you soon The Barstow boys Bug eyes in the shadow of the moon Black houses in the hills and roadside haunts Dying for a place to fall apart Who knew what you could learn to live without Mother Mary's lying...

Dreaming again of a train track ending at the edge of the sea (Big black cloud was low and rolling our way) Dog at the barbed wire barking at my buzz cut friends and me (Sound of a switchblade shining in the summer rain) No one on the corner had a quarter for...

Black hair, the night descending Baby never puts her trust in Tight black tie too quick to laughter Ain't no telling what he's after Found a friend without religion Riding on a stolen engine Far too fast to pacify you Ain't no telling what he's up to...

crack of dawn, the rooster moans wake up boy, you're far from home serpentine, the tracks in flames longest path the devil laid led you straight aboard this rusty train lift your head because you can't sleep bite your lip because you can't eat darkest den the...

The girl down the street saw my ghost on the road But I sailed the backyard asleep in my boat Both paddles broken, no sail for the wind A bathtub, a bottle, to drown myself in And she ran through the town like the end was upon us Screaming like birds abov...

Please, remember me Happily By the rosebush laughing With bruises on my chin The time when We counted every black car passing Your house beneath the hill And up until Someone caught us in the kitchen With maps, a mountain range, A piggy bank A visio...

You, strong as a virgin bird Me, keeping your every word Two dots where a single was Three, counting the little one We sail in the smallest boat Sleep just when the wind is low You see from the sparrow's height Me, seeking you every night Two, sailin...

Touch me while we both have hands We won't keep them very long Watch the window curtain blowing in the breeze Keep your blessed memories It's not what we talk about When the table gossip turns Someday you might find a circle of my friends And they'll cr...

Mary Anne, do you remember the tree by the river when we were seventeen? Dark canyon wall, the call and the answer and the mare in the pasture pitch black and baring its teeth. I recall the sun in our faces, stuck and leaning on braces, and being str...

Lovers accustomed to tragedy See every kiss in the window across the street Breezes and blessings passing by, ah ooh-oh I'm in the shade of the dogwood tree Not the one where you told your name to me Two hungry blackbirds land near by, ah ooh-oh If I c...

Mother don't worry, I killed the last snake that lived in the creek bed Mother don't worry, I've got some money I saved for the weekend Mother remember being so stern with that girl who was with me? Mother remember the blink of an eye when I breathed throug...

I asked you a question I didn't need you to reply Is it getting heavy? And then I realize It's getting heavy Well I thought it was already as heavy as can be Is it overwhelming To use a crane to crush a fly? It's a good time for Superman To lift the...

I was walking far from home Where the names were not burned along the wall Saw a building, high as heaven But the door was so small, door was so small I saw rainclouds, little babies And a bridge that had tumbled to the ground I saw sinners making music...

In a small far room the bed is set With trinkets all surrounding Yet alone it rests, so dry it sets With souls aside abiding There moves legs warm, and close inside No, no leg braces a hello And pictures on walls where paint is lame Where sinks are frie...

found your mittens behind a box of pictures you would wear them before i brewed the tea that's one memory i can easily conjure a weary memory i can always see found your rosary broken into pieces every night, by the bed, you'd kiss the beads those are moments...

Said the plain clothes cop to the beauty queen “I’ve seen nothing but a spoke in a wheel” So she gave up her crown to a kid with a crutch And they both felt cheated after closing the deal And the white tooth man I ran with him Got all cut up from pissin out in...

I saw you wade across the river Winter coat across your shoulders Calling out, what did you say? If I wade across the water When I rise will you be there Holding on or turned the other way? I saw you wade across the river Handkerchief in your fingers...

Wolves by the road and a bike wheel spinning on a pawnshop wall She’ll wring out her colored hair like a butterfly beaten in a summer rainfall And then roll on the kitchen floor of some fucker with a pocketful of foreign change The song of the shepherd’s dog,...

blackbird claw, raven wing under the red sunlight long clothesline, two shirt sleeves waving as we go by hundred years, hundred more someday we may see a woman king, wristwatch time slowing as she goes to sleep black horse fly, lemonade jar on the r...

Fake watches in your broken hand Barely keeping time Barefoot in the city and your phone is ringing Bet you're watching all the happy kids Climbing on a car They were singing something Maybe they were singing: "Become the weeds, we will become Become t...

Blue light setting lotus style in your A-frame in the countryside Stillness slides the door and walks inside Candle on the windowsill Burnt wickless through our low-lit meal Heaven only knows the things you hide In your blue eyes, in your sly smile Tan...