All I ever wanted

I'm on vacation for the next week or so (from posting old songs, not from writing new ones, the writing never rests). See you back around June 3.

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

300 : 2/4/99 : If it Seems

Here’s the truth that passed us by
there’s more to this than meets the eye
and if you see me standing staring
do not pause or ask me why

And if it seems that I’m past caring
past the point of grace or sharing
Even so I’ll carry on a while
I’m nothing if not daring

All that trouble for a lying smile
While I leer and choke back bile
If it seems I have a clue
Please dismiss it all as guile

If it seems it’s down to me and you
Another day another change of venue
Waiting for its day in court
For someone else to say what’s true

It must be all some kind of sport
I always stretch but come up short
I’ll find contentment of a sort
I’ll find contentment of a sort

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

299 : 2/3/99 : Missed Your Bus

I can see him standin’ up there the day you missed your bus
You started running and saying o shit o shit
And he looked down on you; smoked his cigarette
He must have known how say you were he must have known it

You were just as sad as the day he left you
They day he broke your heart and left you all alone
Ain’t it hard how a little misfortune
Seems to make it seem okay for them to cast the first stone

He could hear you coughing from running
Up there on his balcony above it all
He must have known you’d miss your bus
He knows the way they leave and never call

He knows what it’s like to run hopeless
After what you need but can never catch
He knows what it’s like to be watched from above
As you have to start over and over from scratch

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

298 : 2/2/99 : Shadow

Follows like a shadow
stretching round corners
faded in darkness
It sticks to you
Shadowed by a grim cloud
Hangs the threat of every life
the promise of the bitter end
The bitter cup it’s only fitting
Casts its shadow back and forth
along and all ends and all
And past the shadows of regret
The something couldn’t ever get
the past the promise and the bet
My shadow goes out before me
Creeping in my sleeping as
a new day dawns
the sun brings its shadows
with it always

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

297 : 2/1/99 : Get on Track

Everybody’s down with what’s going on
Everybody’s on the short con
Singin’ the same song
Gotta get this gotta get that
Gotta be the heppest cat
Always up at bat
All runnin’ all the writing on the wall
This society of ignorance avarice and thrall
That’s All
They got me chasing around with the rest of them
Me who used to run with the best of them
I am put to the test by Them
They who run with their fingers on the scale
Steal a nickel from every dime bag sale
My sins pale
In comparison to theirs
As they manage their affairs
In gray suits and tall backed chairs
Everybody headin’ one way Jack
But me I’m just lookin’ for the way back
Get on track
Set my wheel on the one way
Read scripture and pray
Live in the one day

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

296 : 1/31/99 : Council of Sedition

Like any ordinary heroes
we’re well acquainted with the gravity of our call
Taking the high road isn’t like
they tell you it is at all
We don’t mind the risks we’re takin’
or the rules we may be breaking
We’re taking something to the people that the people want
Don’t look back and don’t get riled up
We’ve got all our best tricks styled up
Wait around and see this century’s big stunt
Like any Council of Sedition
We’ve positioned ourselves in the right place
We’re waiting for our moment
Creating our own space
Here’s a joint the noise can live in
We cannot back off or give in
What’s riven can’t be mended this time
This time out we’ll hit the very top
Break through the ceiling never stop
Listen to the empty hall the final bell’s chime

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

295 : 1/30/99 : Jonestown

This song contains uncouth and profane lyrics

1,108 : 1 ?




I dreamed I saw the Reverend Jones
Alive and on the street
He said I waited underground
A long long time to preach this beat
Waited for this bad old world
To push its luck far enough down
And now I’m ready to begin
Fuck the world, let’s go to Jonestown
Let’s go to Jonestown
I dreamed I saw a flaming wheel
Was spinning in the air
And hovering above New York
I dreamed that you and I were there
And Jim Jones in a pure white suit
Came riding on a pure white bull
Said fuck the world, let’s go to Jonestown
And celebrate the funeral.

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

294 : 1/29/99 : Hey Mr. Revolutionary

Hey Mr. Revolutionary
how’s this one gonna be any different
How do I know you got the better way
for me to see my time spent
You gotta roll with the punches
You gotta go with the flow
You got to hit the nail right on the head
But when your time comes you got to go
What a revolution that would be
If we could see our deaths in front of us
Waiting for us patiently
Waiting to see us return to dust

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

293 : 1/28/99 : Epistemological Evidence

Epistemological evidence points to a first cause
But a tendency for mysticism persists
In the psyche of the human race, to transcendence our minds are drawn
due to consideration of the questions that are intractable

Hah, hah

And the image of what we have wrought is enough to give me pause
And in my mind some spark of strange attractions resists
The illusion; in the magician’s cabinet the beautiful lady is sawn
In two. Our logic’s a fine scalpel but the blade is not retractable

Ta da

And it doesn’t matter anywhere you go is the same
I’ll get by with my cross and my secret name
You’re always looking for somebody to blame
Might as well pin it on me it’s the secret of my fame

Blah blah

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

292 : 1/27/99 : Have To

Does it really mean anything
If you only do what you have to
is there really anything
We don’t have to do
Really anything can be
balanced on a dime
neatly split in two
The haves and haven’t got times
Thanks to the logic
and dreams of our elders
The earth we’ve inherited’s
Nearing collapse
We all sit straining
our necks out our ears cocked
All listening for the
one-handed claps
Does it really mean anything
That we choose something to listen to
We all take our half but
somebody must take the other half, too

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

291 : 1/26/98 : Dream

I dreamed I saw them dragging you into the pit of hell
Your were clawing at the sheets and screaming not to let them take you
But I knew I knew you must deserve it otherwise
They wouldn’t have been there for you isn’t that true
I saw the ground open wide and breathe out fire
I saw the cataclysmic chasm open wide
an angry mouth of wrath crumbling open
under our feet I dreamed the day I died
I dreamt I spent a month in hell sort of a vacation
from having to invent my own punishments
A month away from making up crazy stories
to short circuit my murderous bents
I dreamed I found a road that went the whole world round
And I traveled on it in a flaming wheel
I dreamed a city made of cobalt glass in 80 story spires
I dreamed I went around a thousand times begging what I could not steal
I wake up every day the same old dull fish that I am
swimming on the edges of the big school
Making our way from nowhere to nowhere
I dreamed a special hell reserved for all us little fish
You can only ever damn your own self in your dreams
All of us who swim along and do not seek another sea
Do not seek another scene or so it seems

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

290 : 1/25/99 : The Last Shattered Verse

To the last shattered verse, a hollow muttered curse
I swore myself to pushing on
This universe of broken symmetry, this lousy existential mystery
What a bad idea it seems to me, what a sad song
To be so languid and unsure, just like the man in the mirror
What difference do I make, Fate gets her take
And we all end up as nothing in the end
you and I we die the same my friend
What a stale paradigm, there's a mountain so we climb
Led by the nose by any possibility
It makes so little sense, everything falls out of sequence
Just because I see it is it my responsibility
The year's end will not end it all, we've quite a distance left to fall
And all in all, all of creation, me and my big imagination
Is such a small small thing a little paper boat
Tossed on the Big Sea try so hard to stay afloat

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

289 : 1/24/99 : Cul de Sac

What’ll you do when you come upon it
what’ll you do when the wall’s at your back
what’ll you do when the options have closed
and you’re right up against the cul de sac?
What would you pay then for just an hour
of easy freedom from want and need
You would give anything you ever had
Now instead you’ll give until you bleed
Is it the case that there must be an end to all things
Isn’t it stranger stranger than it seems
Can it be that nothing that is is ever lost
Could it be that this is all just mirrors and dreams
I came a long way but I fear I lack the proper grit
I’ve tried to be a man but I am just another drone
frozen by the magnitude of what is broken
Fooled into endlessly rolling the stone
Turn turn around turn turn around
Whatever can be entered can be left
Whatever can be bound can be opened
Stretch a tiny bridge across the cleft

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

288 : 1/23/99 : No Try Do

What is cannot
be what is not
What is not can
Never be what
What is is
No try do
Only what is
Can be true
No try trying
is not doing
Only do what
Is to be done
What's done is done
What's tried is none
Untried
just done
right now
just one

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

287 : 1/22/99 : The Honest Men

I’ve got my candle and my candle holder
Don’t know that I’m wiser but I sure am older
I’m out alone in the dark again
Searching for the honest men
I read about infighting in the business classes
I saw the fat cats sitting on their fat asses
I got questions by the bushel and pound
I need an honest man to lead me to the higher ground
I’ve got a feeling this has all been done before
Heard of one in Washington but justice doesn’t live there anymore
I’m getting tired but the night’s so long
How did we all turn out so wrong
Went to the cities and I went to the coasts
My sighing soul made strong petitions to the Lord of Hosts
Who said I’ll spare it all if you can just spare ten
That kept me searching for the honest men
Maybe I should give up moral absolutes
Focus on shoveling the shit into the chutes
All around I see reflections of my worst half
All around I see reflections off the golden calf

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

286 : 1/21/99 : Child of Creation

Child of creation
Just born today
Take a look at America
What do you have to say
This is a strange situation
Come to visit on the fourth of July
Come and see all the pomp and veritas
Come and watch while the parade passes you by
Child of contemplation
Say everything is become strange
You were just born yesterday
We had so little time to arrange
Walk into our garden
and ignore the garbage by path
walk among our rosebuds
and ignore the man who needs a bath
Walk among us
Join our celebration
of our strange decay
Child of creation

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here

285 : 1/20/99 : The Quarry

My Body told me to lay off the writing a while
But I had promises to keep the old story
But I promised to keep it short
Another pebble lifted out of the quarry
So deep so hard so filled with water
just another hole in my head
I gotta give it up for one day
I got to lay and contemplate the feast of the dead

You can read an explanation of the origin of these lyrics here