Joanna Newsom Album

Easy, easy.
My man and me,
we could rest and remain here, easily.
We are tested and pained
by what's beyond our bed.
We are blessed and sustained
by what is not said.

No-one knows what is coming, or
who will harvest what we have sewn,
or how I've been dulling, and dumbing,
in the service of the heart alone,

or how I am worn to the bone
by the river,
and, in the river made of light,
I'm your little life-giver.
I will give my life.

Haven't you seen what I've seen?
Don't you know what you ought to do?
I was born to love,
and I intend to love you.

Down in the valley,
where the fields are green,
Watch my luck turn, fro and to;
pluck every last daisy clean,
till only I may love you.

I am easy,
easy to keep.
Honey, you please me
even in your sleep.
But my arms want to carry.
My heart wants to hold.
Tell me your worries. I want to be told.

Sit, and see how the fog,
from the port in the bay,
lays like snow
at the foot of the roanoke;

hear the frog, going courting,
till the day he croaks,
saying, even then,
There is light in the river.
There is a river made of light.
C'mon, little life-giver.
Give your life.

Who asked you?
Who asked you
if you want to be loved by me?
Who died, and made you in charge
of who loves who?

All the livelong day,
if I have my way, I will love you.
But One can't carry the weight,
or change the fate, of Two.
I've been waiting for a break.
How long's it gonna take?
Let me love you.
How about it?
How about what I have to say?
How about that livelong day?
How am I gonna stay here
without you?

Easy, easy.
You must not fear.
You must meet me, to see me.
I am barely here.
But, like a Bloody Mary,
seen in the mirror:
speak my name
and I appear.

From the courtyard, I floated in
and watched it go down.
Heard the cup drop;
thought, "Well,
that's why they keep them around."
The blackguard sat hard, down,
with no head on him now,
and I felt so bad,
cause I didn't know how
to feel bad enough
to make him proud.

By the time you read this,
I will be so far away.
Daddy longlegs, how in the world
am I to be expected to stay?
In the night--
in the night, you may hear me call
Pa, stay your hand
and steel your resolve.
Stay where you are,
so long and tall.

Here's Lola--ta da!--to do
her famous Spider Dance for you!
Lighten up your pockets!
Shake her skirts and scatter, there,
a shrieking, six-legged millionaire
with a blight in his sockets.

Miss Montez,
the Countess of Lansfeld,
appealed to the King of Bavaria,
saying, "Pretty papa,
if you are my friend--
mister daddy longlegs, they are at it again!--
Can I see you?"

Poor Lola! A tarantula's mounting
Countess Lansfeld's
handsome brassiere,
while they all cheer.

And the old king fell from grace,
while Lola fled,
To save face and her career

You caught a fly, floating by,
Wait for him to drown in the dust;
drown in the dust of other flies,
whereby the machine is run,
and the deed is done.
Heaven has no word
for the way you and your friends
have treated poor Louis.
May god save your poor soul, Lola.
(But there is nothing I adore,
apart from that whore's black heart.)

Well, doesn't that just beat all!
Miss Gilbert,
called to Castlemaine
by the silver dollar and the gold glitter!
Well, I've seen lots,
but never, in a million years,
would think to see you, here.

Though the long road
begins and ends with you,
I cannot seem to make amends
with you, Louis.
When we go out,
they're bound to see you with me.

At night, I walk in the park,
with a whip,
between the lines
of the whispering Jesuits,
who are poisoning you against me.
There's a big black spider
hanging over my door.
Can't go anywhere, anymore.
Tell me, are you with me?

I called to you, several times,
while the change took place
and then arrived, all night,
and I died.
But all these songs,
when you and I are long gone,
will carry on.
Mud in your eye.

You asked my hand,
hired a band.
"In your heart is all that you need;
ask and you will receive," it is said.
I threw my bouquet,
and I knocked 'em dead.

Bottle of white, bottle of red.
Helpless as a child,
when you held me in your arms,
and I knew that no other
could ever love me as you loved.
But help me! I'm leaving!

I remember everything,
down to the sound of you shaving--
the scrape of your razor,
the dully-abrading black hair
that remained
when you clutched at me,
that night I came upstairs, half-dead,
and, in your kindness,
you put me straightaway
in the cupboard,
with a bottle of champagne,
and then, later, on a train.

It was dark out, I was half-dead.
I saw a star fall into the sky,
like a chunk of thrown coal,
as if god himself spat
like a cornered rat.

I really want you to do this for me,
will you have one on me?

It was dark; I was drunk and half-dead,
and we slept, knocking heads,
sitting up in the star-smoking air,
knocking heads like buoys.

Don't you worry for me!
Have one on me!

Meanwhile, I will raise my own glass
to how you made me fast
and expendable,
and I will drink to your excellent health,
and your cruelty.
Will you have one on me?

--helpless as a child,
when you held me in your arms,
and I knew that no other
could ever love me--

From the courtyard, I floated in
and watched it go down.
Heard the cup drop;
thought, "Well, that's why
they keep them around."
The blackguard sat hard, down,
with no head on him now,
and I felt so bad,
cause I didn't know how
to feel bad enough
to make him proud.

Well daddy longlegs, are you?
Daddy longlegs, are you?
Daddy longlegs, are you proud?

I found a little plot of land,
in the garden of Eden.
It was dirt, and dirt is all the same.
I tilled it with my two hands,
and I called it my very own;
there was no one to dispute my claim.

Well, you'd be shocked
at the state of things--
the whole place
had just cleared right out.
It was hotter than hell,
so I laid me by a spring, for a spell,
as naked as a trout.

The wandering eye that I have caught
is as hot as a wandering sun.
But I will want for nothing more,
in my garden:
start again,
in my hardening to every heart but one.

Meet me in the garden of Eden.
Bring a friend.
We are gonna have ourselves a time.
We are gonna have a garden party.
It's on me!
No, sirree, it's my dime.
We broke our hearts,
in the war between
St. George and the dragon,
but both, in equal part,
are welcome to come along.
I'm inviting everyone.

Farewell to loves that I have known,
Even muddiest waters run.
Tell me, what is meant by sin, or none,
in a garden
seceded from the union
in the year of A.D. 1?

The unending amends you've made
are enough for one life.
Be done.
I believe in innocence, little darling.
Start again.
I believe in everyone.
I believe, regardless.
I believe in everyone.

Twenty miles left to the show.
Hello, my old country. Hello.
Stars are just beginning to appear,
and I have never, in my life,
before been here.

And it's my heart, not me,
who cannot drive,
at which conclusion you arrived,
watching me sit here, bolt upright,
and cry for no good reason
at the Eastering sky.

And the tilt of this strange nation,
and the will to remain for the duration
(waving the flag,
feeling it drag).
Like a bump on a bump on a log, baby;
like I'm in a fistfight with the fog, baby;
step, ball-change, and a-pirouette!

And I regret
how I said to you,
Honey, just open your heart,
when I've got trouble
even opening a honey jar.
And that, right there, is where we are.

I've been 'fessing, double-fast,
addressing questions nobody asked.
I'll get this joy off of my chest, at last,
and I will love you
till the noise has long since passed.

I did not mean to shout, Just drive,
Just get us out, dead or alive.
The road's too long to mention--
Lord, it's something to see!--
laid down by the
Good Intentions Paving Company,
all the way to the thing
we've been playing at, darling.
I can see that you're wearing
your staying-hat, darling.

For the time being, all is well.
Won't you love me a spell?
This is blindness, beyond all conceiving,
while behind us, the road is leaving,
and leaving, and falling back
like a rope gone slack.

Well, I saw straightaway
that the lay was steep,
but I fell for you, honey,
easy as falling asleep.
And that, right there,
is the course I keep.

And no amount of talking
is going to soften the fall,
but, like after the rain,
step out of the overhang. That's all.
It had a nice ring to it,
when the old opry house rang,
so, with a solemn auld lang
syne, sealed, delivered,
I sang.

And there is hesitation,
and it always remains
(concerning you, me,
and the rest of the gang),
but, in our quiet hour,
I feel I see everything,
and am in love
with the hook
upon which everyone hangs.

And I know you meant
to show the extent
to which you gave a goddang--
you ranged real hot and real cold,
but I'm sold,
I am at home on that range.
And I do hate to fold,
right here, at the top of my game,
when I've been trying
with my whole heart and soul
to stay right here, in the right lane.
But it can make you feel over, and old
(Lord, you know it's a shame),
when I only want for you to pull over,
and hold me,
till I can't remember my own name.

Allelu, allelu:
I have died happy,
and lived to tell the tale to you.
I have slept for forty years,
and woke to find me gone.
I woke safe and warm in your arms.

Not informed of the natural law,
squatting, lordly, on a stool, in a stall,
we spun gold clear out of straw.
And, when our bales of bullion
were stored,
you burned me like a barn.
I burned safe and warm in your arms.

I'm afraid of the Big Return.
There's a certain conversation lost,
and that loss incurred
with nobody remaining,
to register who had passed this way,
in the night,
in the middle of the night
(negating their grace and their sight),
till only I remember, or mark,
how we had our talk:

We took our ride,
so that there was no-one home,
and the lights of Rome
flickered and died.
And, what's more,
I believe that you knew it, too;
I think you saw their flares,
and kept me safely unawares,
in your arms.

The grass was tall, and strung with burrs,
I essayed that high sashay which,
in my mind, was my way;
you hung behind, in yours.
Anyhow, she did not neigh.
I do not know
what drew our eyes to hers;
that little black mare did not stir,
till I lay down in your arms.

Poor old dirty little dog-size horse!--
swaying and wheezing,
as a matter of course;
swaying and wheezing,
as a matter of pride.
That poor old nag, not four palms wide,
had waited a long time,
coated in salt,
buckled like a ship run foul of the fence.
In the middle of the night,
she'd sprung up,
no provenance,
bearing the whites of her eyes.

And you, with your
'arrangement' with Fate,
nodded sadly at her lame assault
on that steady old gate,
her faultlessly etiolated fishbelly-face;
the muzzle of a ghost.

And, pretty Johnny Appleseed,
via satellite feed,
tell us, who was it
that you then loved the most?
Pretty Johnny Appleseed,
leave a trail that leads
straight back down to the farm.
Lay me down
safe and warm in your arms.

This is the song for Baby Birch.
I will never know you.
And at the back of what we've done,
there is that knowledge of you.

I wish we could take every path.
I could spend a hundred years
adoring you.
Yes, I wish we could take every path,
because I hated to close
the door on you.

Do you remember staring,
up at the stars,
so far away in their bulletproof cars?
We heard the rushing, slow intake
of the dark, dark water,
and the engine breaks,
and I said,

How about them engine breaks?
And, if I should die before I wake,
will you keep an eye on Baby Birch?
Because I'd hate to see her
make the same mistakes.

When it was dark,
I called and you came.
When it was dark, I saw shapes.
When I see stars, I feel, in your hand,
and I see stars,
and I reel, again.

Well mercy me, I'll be goddamned.
It's been a long, long time
since I last saw you.
And I have never known the plan.
It's been a long, long time.
How are you?
Your eyes are green. Your hair is gold.
Your hair is black. Your eyes are blue.
I closed the ranks, and I doubled back--
but, you know, I hated to close
the door on you.

We take a walk along the dirty lake.
Hear the goose,
cussing at me over her eggs.
You poor little cousin.
I don't want your dregs
(a little baby fussing all over my legs).

There is a blacksmith,
and there is a shepherd,
and there is a butcher boy,
and there is a barber, who's cutting
and cutting away at my only joy.
I saw a rabbit,
as slick as a knife,
and as pale as a candlestick,
and I had thought it'd be harder to do,
but I caught her, and skinned her quick:
held her there,
kicking and mewling,
upending, unspooling, unsung and blue;
told her "wherever you go,
little runaway bunny,
I will find you."
And then she ran,
as they're liable to do.

Be at peace, baby,
and be gone.
Be at peace, baby,
and be gone.

Hey hey hey, the end is near!
On a good day,
you can see the end from here.
But I won't turn back, now,
though the way is clear;
I will stay for the remainder.

I saw a life, and I called it mine.
I saw it, drawn so sweet and fine,
and I had begun to fill in all the lines,
right down to what we'd name her.

Our nature does not change by will.
In the winter, 'round the ruined mill,
the creek is lying, flat and still;
it is water,
though it's frozen.

So, 'cross the years,
and miles, and through,
on a good day,
you can feel my love for you.
Will you leave me be,
so that we can stay true
to the path that you have chosen?

We picked our way
down to the beach,
watching the waves
dragging out of our reach:
tangling tails, like a sodden sheet;
dangling entrails
from the gut of the sea.

Hoarding our meals (alfalfa and rolls);
trying not to catch
the cold eyes of the gulls--
I hope Mother Nature has not
overheard!
(Though, she doles out hurt
like a puking bird.)

We stayed for the winter.
No-one told us
about the laws of the land.
I hold my own.
But you, with your hunger--
you, on the other hand--
make yourself known.

And when we were found,
I know we both grieved.
My heart made the sound of
snow falling from eaves.
You and me, Bess,
we were as thick as thieves.
So I swore, nonetheless, up and down,
it was only me.
They took me away,
and, after some time
studying my case,
must have made up their minds.
By the time you realized I was dying,
it must have been too late.
I believe you were not lying.

It is the day.
I wake,
with my ears cocked up like a gun
(like every day, of course),
yanked by my wrists
to the sugar-front courtyard--
now tell me, what have I done?
It seems I have stolen a horse.
I step to the gallows.

Who do you think you are--
arching your hooves like a crane,
in the shallow gutter
that lines the boulevards,
crowded with folks
who just stare as I hang?
It's all the same.
Kindness comes over me;
what was your name?
It makes no difference.
I'm glad that you came.
Forever, I'll listen to your glad neighing.

My heart became a drunken runt
on the day I sunk in this shunt,
to tap me clean
of all the wonder
and the sorrow I have seen,
since I left my home:

My home, on the old Milk Lake,
where the darkness does fall so fast,
it feels like some kind of mistake
(just like they told you it would;
just like the Tulgeywood).

When I came into my land,
I did not understand:
neither dry rot, nor the burn pile,
nor the bark-beetle, nor the dry well,
nor the black bear.

But there is another,
who is a little older.
When I broke my bone,
he carried me up from the riverside.

To spend my life
in spitting-distance
of the love that I have known,
I must stay here, in an endless eventide.

And if you come and see me,
you will upset the order.
You cannot come and see me,
for I set myself apart.
But when you come and see me,
in California,
you cross the border of my heart.

Well, I have sown untidy furrows
across my soul,
but I am still a coward,
content to see my garden grow
so sweet & full
of someone else's flowers.

But sometimes
I can almost feel the power.
Sometimes I am so in love with you
(like a little clock
that trembles on the edge of the hour,
only ever calling out "Cuckoo, cuckoo").

When I called you,
you, little one,
in a bad way,
did you love me?
Do you spite me?
Time will tell if I can be well,
and rise to meet you rightly.
While, moving across my land,
brandishing themselves
like a burning branch,
advance the tallow-colored,
walleyed deer,
quiet as gondoliers,
while I wait all night, for you,
in California,
watching the fox pick off my goldfish
from their sorry, golden state--
and I am no longer
afraid of anything, save
the life that, here, awaits.

I don't belong to anyone.
My heart is heavy as an oil drum.
I don't want to be alone.
My heart is yellow as an ear of corn,
and I have torn my soul apart, from
pulling artlessly with fool commands.

Some nights
I just never go to sleep at all,
and I stand,
shaking in my doorway like a sentinel,
all alone,
bracing like the bow upon a ship,
and fully abandoning
any thought of anywhere
but home,
my home.
Sometimes I can almost feel the power.
And I do love you.
Is it only timing,
that has made it such a dark hour,
only ever chiming out,
"Cuckoo, cuckoo"?

My heart, I wear you down, I know.
Gotta think straight,
keep a clean plate;
keep from wearing down.
If I lose my head,
just where am I going to lay it?

(For it has half-ruined me,
to be hanging around,
here, among the daphne,
blooming out of the big brown;
I am native to it, but I'm overgrown.
I have choked my roots
on the earth, as rich as roe,
here,
down in California.)

I was tired of being drunk.
My face cracked like a joke.
So I swung through here
like a brace of jackrabbits,
with their necks all broke.

I stumbled at the door with my boot,
and I knocked against the jam.
and I scrabbled at your chest, like a mute,
with my fists of ham.
trying to tell you that I am
telling you I can--
I can
love you again;
love you again.

I'm squinting towards the East.
My faith makes me a dope.
But you can take my hand,
in the darkness, darling,
like a length of rope.
I shaped up overnight, you know,
the day after she died.
when I saw my heart,
and I'll tell you, darling,
it was open wide.
what with telling you I am
telling you I can--
I can
love you again;
love you again.

It can have no bounds, you know.
It can have no end.
You can take my hand
in the darkness, darling,
when you need a friend.
And it can change in shape or form,
but never change in size.
Well the water, it ran deep, my darling,
where it don't run wide.

The feather of a hawk was bound,
bound around my neck;
a poultice made of fig,
the eager little vultures pecked.
And a verse I read in jest
in Matthew, spoke to me;
said There's a flame that moves
like a low-down pest
and says, You will be free

only, tell me that I can
tell me that I can:
I can love you again;
love you again.

Last night, again,
you were in my dream.
Several expendable limbs were at stake.
You were a prince, spinning rims,
all sentiments indian-given
and half-baked.
I was brought
in on a palanquin
made of the many bodies
of beautiful women.
Brought to this place, to be examined,
swaying on an elephant:
a princess of India.

We both want the very same thing.
We are praying
I am the one to save you.
But you don't even own
your own violence.
Run away from home--
your beard is still blue
with the loneliness of you mighty men,
when your jaws, and fists, and guitars,
and pens, and your sugarlip,
but I've never been to the firepits
with you mighty men.

Who made you this way?
Who made you this way?
Who is going to bear
your beautiful children?
Do you think you can just stop,
when you're ready for a change?
Who will take care of you
when you're old and dying?

You burn in the Mekong,
to prove your worth.
Go long! Go long!
Right over the edge of the earth!
You have been wronged,
tore up since birth.
You have done harm.
Others have done worse.

Will you tuck your shirt?
Will you leave it loose?
You are badly hurt.
You're a silly goose.

You are caked in mud,
and in blood, and worse.
Chew your bitter cud.
Grope your little nurse.

Do you know why
my ankles are bound in gauze?
(sickly dressage:
a princess of Kentucky)?
In the middle of the woods
(which were the probable cause),
we danced in the lodge
like two panting monkeys.

I will give you a call, for one last hurrah.
If this tale is tall, forgive my scrambling.
But you keep palming along the wall,
moving at a blind crawl,
but always rambling.

Wolf-spider, crouch in your funnel nest.
If I knew you, once,
now I know you less.
In the sinking sand,
where we've come to rest,
have I had a hand in your loneliness?

When you leave me alone
in this old palace of yours,
it starts to get to me. I take to walking.
What a woman does is open doors.
And it is not a question of locking
or unlocking.

Well, I have never seen
such a terrible room--
gilded with the gold teeth
of the women who loved you!
Now, though I die,
Magpie, this I bequeath:
by any other name,
a Jay is still blue

with the loneliness
of you mighty men,
with your mighty kiss
that might never end,
while, so far away,
in the seat of the West,
burns the fount
of the heat
of that loneliness.

There's a man
who only will speak in code,
backing slowly, slowly down the road.
May he master everything
that such men may know
about loving, and then letting go.

Mercy me, the night is long.
Take my pen, to write you this song.

Lord: is it harder to carry on,
or to know when you are done?

All my life, I've felt as though
I'm inside a beautiful memory,
replaying
with the sound turned down low.

Long-life, show your face.
Slow-heart, curb your taste.
Smoke me out of my hiding place.
Long-life, state your case.

What in the world are we waiting for--
building glowing cities along the shore,
where the wind batters in,
baiting my kin like a matador?

So much value, placed upon
what lies just beyond our plans:
waving my handkerchief,
running along, till the end of the sand.

Long-life, speak your name.
I'm so tired of the guessing game.
But, something is moving,
just out of frame:
Slow-heart,
brace and aim.

Breaching slowly, across the sea,
one mast--
a flash, like the stinger of a bee--
to take you away,
a swarming fleet is gonna take you
from me.

The universe is getting loose:
sodden spread,
from some leaden disuse,
rushing, unhinged,
toward diminishing lights,
like a headless caboose.

I'll wait for you,
alongside the ocean,
and make do
with my no-skin.
But then, Long-life,
will you let me in?
And then, Slow-heart,
are you gonna know him?
Long-life, speak your name.
I wait, while I decry the wait.
And when I die, may I relate:
Slow heart, congregate.

To leave your home, and your family,
for some distortion of property?
Well, darling, I can't go.
But you may stay
here, with me.

So, so long ago,
and so far away,
when Time was just a line
that you fed me,
when you wanted to stay,

we'd talk
as soft as chalk,
till morning came, as pale as a pearl:

No time!
No, no time!
Now, I have got all the time
in the world.

Say, honey, did you belong to me?
Tell me, honey,
was your heart at rest when, darlin,
all the mourning doves were howling us
a song of love's
godawful lawlessness?
Say, honey, did you belong to me?
Tell me, darlin, did I pass your test?
I lay, as still as death, until the dawn,
whereupon I wrested from
that godawful lawlessness.

I roam around the tidy grounds
of my dappled sanatorium.
Coatless, I sit
amongst the moles, adrift,
and I dote upon my pinesap gum.
And the light, through the pines,
in brassy tines,
lays over me, dim as rum
and thick as molasses.
And so time passes.
And so, my heart, tomorrow comes.

I feel you, leaning,
out back with the crickets,
loyal heart marking the soon-ness,
darkness:
tonight, still,
the mourning doves
will summon us their song
of love's neverdoneing lawlessness

while, over and over--
rear up! stand down! lay round!--
trying to sound-out,
or guess the reasons,
I sleep like a soldier, without rest.
But there is no treason,
where there is only lawlessness.

In the last week
of the last year I was aware,
I took a blind shot, across the creek,
at the black bear,
when he roused me in the night,
and left me cowering with my light,
calling out
Who is there?
Who's there?
Who is there?

I watched you sleep,
repeating my prayer.
(Give love a little shove
and it becomes terror.)
Now I am calling,
in a sadness beyond anger
and beyond fear,
Who is there? Who's there?
Who is there?

I glare and nod,
like the character, God,
bearing down
upon the houses and lawns.
I knew a little bit,
but, darling, you were it,
and, darling, now it is long gone.
Sweetheart, in your clean, bright start--
back there, behind a hill, and a dell,
and a state line or two--
I'll be thinking of you.
Yes, I'll be thinking,
and be wishing you well.
We land, I stand,
But I wait for the sound of the bell.
I have to catch a cab,
and my bags are at the carousel.
And then--Lord, just then--
time alone will only tell.

I can feel a difference.
Today, a difference:
all of us, in our tents,
fearing god like a mistress.

We lay on the rocks, in the sun,
watching you and your mama row in,
I sat up and blinked,
when you appeared,
so pale you were nearly clear!

Later, I stumbled to my bed,
all alone in the branches.
I laid in the dark,
thinking about all of my friends,
and their changes.

And I do not know
if you know just what you have done.
You are the sweetest one
I have ever laid my eyes upon.

It's a beautiful town,
with the rain coming down.
Blackberry, rosemary,
jimmy-crack-corn.
You've got the run of the place,
now that you're running around;
and may kindness,
kindness, kindness abound.

In this hour of our lives--
hour of effortless plenty--
how do we know
which parts of our hearts want what,
with such base generosity?

Taking so many photographs--
so amazed!--
we've never seen a baby so newlyborn.
And, when the bulbs do flash,
as bright as morning,
the crowd keeps on gathering
like an electric storm.

The phantom of love
moves among us at will.
Each phantom-limb lost,
has got an angel
(so confused,
like the wagging bobbed-tail
of a bulldog):
kindness, kindness prevails.

Kindness prevails!
Ties and rails fall into line,
bearing kindness.
Where will you go, if not here?
What will you say,
when you write to us?

This is a world of terrible hardship,
everywhere,
and I search for words
to set you at ease.
But there, in the looking-glass,
a kite is soaring,
stilling my warring heart
and my trembling knees.

Clean as a breeze,
bright as the day:
all of the people gather to say:
"Sweet Esme! Sweet Esme!
Oh, oh, oh!"

I believe love will always surround you--
brave as a bear,
with a heart rare and true.
But if you are scared,
if you are blue,
I have prepared this small song for you:
Sweet Esme! Sweet Esme!
Oh, oh, oh!

Driven through by her own sword,
summer died last night, alone.
Even the ghosts
huddled up for warmth.
Autumn has come to my hometown.

Friendly voices, dead and gone,
singing, Star of the country down...
(even the ghosts help raise the barn,
here, now, in my hometown)

--when, out of the massing
that bodes and bides, in the cold west,
flew a waxwing, who froze
and died against my breast!
All the while, rain,
like a weed in the tide,
swans and lists, down
on the gossiping lawns,
saying tsk tsk tsk.

I may have changed. It's hard to gauge.
Time won't account for how I've aged.
Would I could tie your lying tongue,
who says that leaving keeps you young.

I have got no control
over my heart, over my mind.
Over the hills, the rainclouds roll.
I'll winter here, wait for a sign

to cast myself
out, over the water,
riven like a wishbone.
You'd hardly guess
I was my own mother's daughter;
I ain't naturally given to roam.
I lay low, when I return,
and I move
like a gurney
whose wheels are squeaking,
alone, here in my home,
and I laugh,
when you speak of my
pleasure-seeking
among the tall pines,
along the lay-lines.
Here, where the loon keens.
There, where the moon leans.
There,
where I know my violent love lays down,
in a row of silent, dove-gray days.
Here, in a row of silent, dove-gray days.

Wherever I go, I am snowbound
by thoughts of him
whom I would sun.
I loved them all,
one by one.
Cannot gain ground,
cannot outrun;
but time marches along.
You can't always stick around.
But, when the final count is done,
I will be in my hometown.
I will be in my hometown.

There is a spring, not far from here,
The water runs both sweet and clear--
both sweet and clear, and cold:
could crack your bones
with veins of gold.

I stood, a-wagging, at the tap;
just a-waiting on the lagging, rising sap.
I held the cold tin ladle to my lip.
At the Shrine of the Thousand Arms,
I lowered my eyes to sip.

What a beautiful day to catch my drift,
or be caught up in it.
You want your love, Love?
Come and get your love;
I only took it back
because I thought you didn't.

How my ears did ring,
at the municipal pound,
from that old hangdog
to which I was bound:
curled 'round the bottom rung--
doesn't anybody want you?
Well, come on, darlin.
I could use someone like you around.
I am not like you, I ain't from this place.
And I do reserve the right
to repeat all my same mistakes.
And, in the night, like you,
I certainly bite and chew
what I can find,
and never seem to lose the taste.

What a horrible face I feel me make--
For Pete's sake,
what you have told me, I cannot erase!--
(Though I keep on saying,
and I do believe, it is not too late).

All day, you're hassling me with trifles:
black nose of the dog, as cold as a rifle,
indicating, with a nudge,
God, No God. God, No God.
Sweet, appraising eye of the dog,
blink once if god,
twice if no god.

My mama may be ashamed of me,
with all of my finery:
carrying on,
whooping it up till the early morn,
lost and lorn,
among the madding revelry!
Sure, I can pass.
Honey, I can pass.
Particularly when I start to tip my glass.
I'll be a sport,
and have a go at that old song,
singing unabashed, about
"Them city girls,
with their ribbon bows,
and their fancy sash..."

But, though I get so sad
(could swear the night
makes a motion to claim me,
around that second verse),
I reckon I've felt worse,
and still held fast.
But, later on, when I am alone,
alone at last,
then I take my god to task.
I take my god to task.

Whose is the hand that I will hold?
Whose is the face I will see?
Whose is the name that I will call,
when I am called to meet thee?

In this life, who did you love,
beneath the drifting ashes,
beneath the sheeting banks of air
that barrenly bore our rations?

When I could speak, it was too late.
Didn't you hear me calling?
Didn't you see my heart leap,
like a pup in the constant barley?

In this life, where did you crouch,
when the sky had set to boiling?
Burning within, seen from without,
and your gut was a serpent, coiling.

And, for the sake of that pit of snakes,
for whom did you allay your shyness,
and spend all your mercy,
and madness, and grace,
in a day, beneath the bending cypress?

It was not on principal.
Show, Pro-heart, that you have got gall.
A miracle:
I can bear a lot, but not that pall.

I can bear a lot, but not that pall!
Kingfisher, sound the alarm.
Say, "Sweet little darlin, now,
come to my arms;
tell me all about the love
you left on the farm."

He was a kind, unhurried man
with a heavy lip and a steady hand,
but he loved me just like a little child;
like a little child loves a little lamb.

Thrown to the ground,
by something down there;
bitten by the bad air,
while the clouds tick;
trying to read all the signs,
preparing for when the bombs hit;
hung from the underbelly of the earth,
while the stars skid away, below,
gormless and brakeless, gravel-loose,
falling silent as gavels in the snow

I lay back and spit my chaw,
wrapped in the long arm of the Law,
who has seen it all:
I can bear a lot, but not that pall.

I can bear a lot, but not that pall!
Kingfisher, cast your fly:
oh, Lord,
it happens without even trying,
when I sling a low look
from my shuttering eye.

Blows rain upon the one you loved,
and, though you were only sparring,
there's blood on the eye.
Unlace the glove.
Say, Honey I am not sorry.

Stand here and name
the one you loved,
beneath the drifting ashes,
and, in naming, rise above time,
as it, flashing, passes.

We came by the boatload,
and were immobilized:
worshipping volcanoes,
charting the loping skies.
The tides of the earth
left us bound, and calcified,
and made as obstinate as obsidian,
unmoving, save our eyes:
just mooning and blinking
from faces marked with coal.
(Ash cooling and shrinking
cracks loud as thunder rolling.)
I swear I know you. You know me.
Where have we met before?
Tell me true:
to whose authority
do you consign your soul?

I had a dream you came to me,
said
You shall not do me harm anymore,
and with your knife,
you evicted my life
from its little lighthouse
on the seashore.

And I saw that my blood
had no bounds,
spreading in a circle like an atom bomb,
soaking and felling
everything in its path,
and welling in my heart like a birdbath.

It is too short--
the day we are born,
we commence with our dying.
Trying to serve,
with the heart of a child;
kingfisher, lie with the lion.

I will pack up my pretty dresses.
I will box up my high-heeled shoes.
A sparkling ring, for every finger,
I'll put away, and hide from view.

Coats of boucle, jacquard and cashmere;
cartouche and tweed, all silver shot--
and everything that could remind you
of how easy I was not.

I'll tuck away my gilded buttons;
I'll bind my silks in shapeless bales;
I'll wrap it all on up, in reams of tissue,
and then I'll kiss you, sweet, farewell.

You saw me rise to our occasion,
and so deny the evidence.
You caused me to burn, and twist, and grimace against you,
like something caught on a barbed-wire fence.

Now, you can see me fall back here, redoubled,
full bewildered and amazed.
I have gotten into some terrible trouble,
beneath your blank and rinsing gaze.

It does not suffice for you to say I am a sweet girl,
or to say you hate to see me sad because of you.
It does not suffice to merely lie beside each other,
as those who love each other do.

I picture you, rising up in the morning:
stretching out on your boundless bed,
beating a clear path to the shower,
scouring yourself red.

The tap of hangers swaying in the closet--
unburdened hooks and empty drawers--
and everywhere I tried to love you
is yours again, and only yours.