Paul Dempsey Album

Come rebuild your memory with a small mountain of burning leaves
And a swinging wire door that slams shut like a guillotine
Strum a note up in the wires
To send bats down the river, seagulls around spires
And shred all the twilight, scatter it city-wide

Those average angels
The drunken saints with heavy heads
They can keep dreaming,
Dreaming of sleep down the end of the bed

But nobody's ever gonna break your heart again...

And the high-pitched, crooked thoughts
That ricocheted off the walls
She just set them down quiet, safe in her dresser drawer
She laid me out on the laundromat floor
And said you'll be not nearly who you were anymore

And i'll always be here to remind you what time is for

And those average angels
The drunken saints with heavy heads
You see their spirits are cowering under the table
And they're still counting,
Counting the breaths under their breath

But nobody's ever...
Nobody's ever gonna break your heart again...

I'll bet good money, i'll bet some beautiful money
That we could agree with anybody here to disagree
That we could get up from the table and nobody would know -
You could leave your mouth talking and follow me out of the window
I've idled here as long as i can, i've taken my entertainment like a man
I'm all ribbons, scissors, flowers and shaken hands
I'm a name in a black book attached to a face
At the back of your memory's window display
It's on the tip of your tongue i'm sure, but i must away
Must be good to know people who know so many people
Must be good to be somebody, good to be somebody they know
The fastest of friends, the fastest of friends, i'm sure we'll all be
The fastest of friends, the fastest of friends, i'm sure we'll remain...
Die here in our deck chairs surrounded by beautiful shoes
Or hide out and meet down at the bottom of the swimming pool
Climb the tower to the bell curve that cuts us all so clean
Or shoot our sharpened arrows at their family trees
'Cause i know no quicker way dear, to the shiny gates of hell
Than a room full of handsome devils comparing everything to everything else
They just keep coming on like a driverless train
And i can think of nothing adorable to say
It's half past the hour, it looks like rain - do you like me? Can i go now?
At the end of the yellow brick drive nobody looks for us,
On our backs on the roof of a car we'll watch the switchboard lighting up

The fastest of friends, the fastest of friends, i'm sure we'll all be
The fastest of friends, the fastest of friends, i'm sure we'll remain...
And don't worry baby they won't let the ship go down without us...

Thrown out of a moving limousine
Tied up in corners with no hope of escape
Followed at high speed
Roughed up and handcuffed and led away

Dangled upside down from a great height
Tied to the rails as the train rounds the bend
Hijacked and hotwired
Snarled at by dogs against the chain link fence

Then she tells you
She tells you
She tells you you're not home

Sucked out of the airlock
Cornered like a rat in the crowded city square
Lowered into volcanoes
Bound up back to back in smart matching chairs

She tells you
She tells you oh
She tells you you're not home

My sweetheart dreams
My sweetheart dreams in an empty bed
My sweetheart dreams of revenge.

Left for dead in mexico
Forged and counterfeit, invisible ink
Cut out words on a ransom note
Oh i beg you honey it's not what you think

then she tells you
she tells you
she tells you you're not home
then she tells you you're not home

typing letters to the dead
late at night on a closed piano lid
she circles past, she fills your glass
but she doesn't recognise the song
once in a lifetime she says
the waking life stitched together in your head
well, what if it's only worth
the bundle of nerves it's written on?
and i don't need these arms anymore
i don't need this heart now, to love
i don't need this skin and bone at all
there's a way you've alwys known her
telephone between her cheek and her shoulder
and eyes like crystal balls
that just won't shut up about the future of the future
and ramona was a waitress
all but made of information
in a bar under the third bridge
she says she's looking forward to living forever
when i won't need these arms anymore
when i won't need this heart now to love
and i won't need this skin and bone at all
at all...
and ramona was a waitress...

Now, this is not funny
The shortest time feels like the longest time
It's surely a dream
Or i'm just an unreliable witness to everything

The burning cars of movie stars
Unwrap the city one backstreet at a time
The severed heads of supermen,
See how they're different when you hold them under the light

Now she's got all, she's got all your answers
So you better take us to your leader
'Cause one thing is for sure -
We're gonna get what we deserve.

Now the street is a river
And the sounds drift up to our window above
And we run down to drown under the current
To go rushing ever forward to find a cheap cure for memory

We drink our fill from wishing wells
We feed coins into machines until they're throwing them up
In crowded bars under neon stars
Until there's new blood racing 'round the both of us

Now we've got all your answers
When she clicks her heels together
Now when she snaps her fingers
You better take us to your leader
'Cause my love, my word -
we're finally gonna get what we deserve

Hey living thing, buy me a drink
and drive me out to the airport
Give me two hundred dollars and say
the best thing anyone's ever said
If you steal every word from your grandmothers' purse
and lay them out on the dashboard
we'll be fine...

Hey living thing, if you're turning in
I'll wake you when something changes
then I'll ring all the bells again
and you'll spill champagne in my shoes
we'll make rose-coloured smoke from bad horoscopes,
confetti from news pages
and you'll be mine...

The same heart attack
will keep feeding back
Right under the streets
skipping every other beat

So hey living thing, let me in
to the world you're living in

Hey living thing, you've waited for it
from billions counting backwards
like a dog on a fire escape
like a bird in a basement
Now release your breath form it's paper bag
and no matter what you hear,
if green lights come raining down tonight
it means tomorrow's another year...

and the same heart attack
will keep feeding back
Right under the streets
Skipping every other beat

Hey living thing, you're breathing again
You're breathing again....

i could catch up to where you are
and see if we can make it right
if i thought meeting you somewhere in the dark
was gonna shed any new light
oh we'd sit around, we'd talk awhile
make polite excuses
but the cat has my tongue and i'm not saying much
'cause i get shy around bullshit
my new time-piece, is watching ice melt
down the bottom of my glass
and i love to watch them fuses burn
down towards their future plans
get me thinking about - it's time to empty out
these pockets of their idle hands
and sing la da dadada la da dadada
lock all the doors, pull the phone from the wall, run and hide
oh i used to be, i used to be such a nice guy
maybe clarity will creep up on me
and reset my senses like a clock
and you'll convince me that your reality
is a better idea than the one that i've got
and you'll give me a second chance at my second chance
and we will laugh about my near miss
and the good lord will reward my ignorance
with a little bliss
and i'll see a welcome face in the mirro that i don't recognise
oh i used to be, i used to be such a nice guy
but now the details are vague, it's so strange, like a previous life
oh i used to be such a nice guy
but now you say i don't know when to admit that i'm lost -
when to stubbornly insist that i'm not
oh dear bless every thought in your thoughtful head

Now the days hemorrhage hours
the messenger's are overwhelmed
delivering - postcards from heaven
urgent telegrams from hell
while the architects cut bloody lines
the grandfather clocks take their elderly time
for two ancient hands to align
and call for the blessed bells to strike.....

Bring me some stolen jewel, some ring of truth
when you come around

honey just place your hands upon my head
and cast the devil out

Or have you fallen out of love?

Now, anything is possible
and when time turns my heresy into gospel
you can share the stars with me
they're the most beautiful thing we will ever see
and they found stories in the patterns
i don't know if they're real, i don't know if it matters
to a chip off the old pillar of salt
when the doves have scattered....

Bring me some stolen jewel, some shred of proof
when you come around

Honey just place your hand upon my chest
and cast the devil out

Or have you fallen out of love?
Have you fallen out of love?
Have you fallen out of love?
You've been waiting so long for him to show up....

Y'know you did everything right
Tried to be dependable everytime,
So it's hard - to understand why
You're the one who should find - it harder to sleep at night

And get needled by the thought
That you may have been mistaken all along,
While you wait - wait and wait for a call
But the phone it doesn't cry from it's cradle at all

It would be something if
If somehow after this
You could still call yourself - the great optimist
So you find somewhere to be
Where you don't feel you're caught between
And where you won't get crushed by the counterweight
That's gonna buckle under the strain of all your disbelief
And light comes through the leaves
Like bandits shooting at your feet
And indeed, there's honour among thieves
And the good guys always win the day eventually

It would be something if
If somehow after this
You could still call yourself - the great optimist

You've got glue in your feathers
What brought you to this
A flightless bird surrounded by red-handed kids
In their borrowed black sheeps' clothes
Yeah everybody's in on the joke...

So practice your boredom
Look a thousand times removed
'Cause only a freak would sing in a crowded waiting room
They would turn you out in the cold
Now that everybody's in on the joke...

Are you missing a stranger that you might have loved?
Do you feel that there's something you don't feel enough?
There's a perfectly good poison for the perfectly numb
If you want some...

But naming the feeling
Just kills the charade
And if flowers should bloom upon your wallpaper face
It'll follow you everywhere you go
Now everybody's in on the joke.

Desire only burns and
Envy's always green
A mind can only race and a heart can only beat
There's these towering neon signs we must uphold
To keep out the blackness
And run with the blue
Now only a fool would sing as if he's telling the truth
Kid, just swallow down that lump in your throat
Because everybody's in on the joke

Are you missing a stranger that you might have loved?
Do you feel that there's something you don't feel enough?
There's a perfectly good poison.....

Are you missing a stranger that you might have loved?
Do you feel that there's something you don't feel enough?
There's a perfectly good poison for the perfectly numb
If you want some...

The man of the moment is just way ahead of his time,
Could be why you see just distance in his eyes
He could be watching ashes grow,
Where all your best seeds were just now sown
But for all i know there's far more i don't...

New rays of light must fight for a place between the leaves
So son don't seem surprised to find no shade beneath this tree
Just like abe' you can't think twice
When offered your piece of the franchise
Now every kid expects a birth-right...

Hand-me-down, hand-me-down oh brother,
Now it's your turn, it's your turn to deliver...
Hand-me-down, hand-me-down oh brother,
What's the measure of a man, made to measure...

It's some privilege to claim that only the strong survive -
If you can choose the time and place and what you'll sacrifice
We'll all get our piece of the dream
And the have-nots will have to take another hit for the team
Well that's just how it's always been...

It went something like - garden. Tree. Adam and eve. And father, pray, forgive.
But if i never hear that shit again i'll live and live and live and live
And whatever made the world go round before
Is probably what will keep it going round after they're gone