New Store No. 2

Marvelous afternoon
From the bed over your head i see it
Through the window where I put my head through
A bird flies in and lands on you
And your eyes open
To a Love Supreme
How did the bird get in you ask
I say i took down the screen
Hey you loon put down the broom
There’s plenty of room

There’s a hole in the window
Where i put my head through
And I’m flying out of it
Come if you want to
Come if you want to

Long steps and nervous laughter
You start to say what are you after
You do say it’s too far down
I don’t plan on touching the ground
Don’t you see what i mean i say
As i flap my arms like wings

Thought i was joking
Thought i was on the ledge
Ah your mouth dropped open
When you looked over the edge
And that’s when I pulled you into something
You don’t have to see to believe in

Little bottles and cigarettes.
The new year’s not so new
Resolutions become regrets
You let it get to you

All heads shake
All hearts break
All hands wave goodbye
Try slow down
The merry-go-round
Give it one more try

You give up
And go down like a martyr
We keep walking
Walking through the water
You give up
And go down like a martyr
We give in
And keep walking through the water

Large eyes laughing
Babble and tears
Heroes died on you
Bury them up above your head
And pray they’ll pull you through

Knock me out
Flap and shout
You just crawl away
Sky turns black
The clay feet crack
Nothing left to say

Beirut Lebanon
To a small Arkansas town
K. J. Jamell
Dug his roots into the ground
That town leans like a sunken ship
In forgotten waters
Where a Lebanese man
Married the youngest of seven daughters

Got drunk with pretty boy Floyd
Loaded cannons in the Korean War
Sharpened knives and pedaled Levi's
Then opened a general store
Where Petit Jean lies on top of the mountain
And the paper mill makes the whole town smell rotten
Sammie races trains driving the boys insane
New Store Number Two gone but not forgotten

He was the king
She was the queen
Fig trees surrounded the castle
Now they're all dead and
The crown from his head
Sits on the head of a jackal

Masters of mankind mark off the scene
In the shape of the American Dream
Now that dream swings
In the warm southern breeze
In the shade
Of the tall forgotten trees

Was it magic he mumbled
No one understood what he said
But with two fingers he lifted
The table above his head

Just me and the brush
In a small room near the roof
Believe in Eloise
We’re searching for the proof
The invisible
No one else believes
Color and shape escape
When it comes to Eloise
For a moment she's so clear
But it all disappears
The muscles in the hand
Don’t seem to understand
The lovely face of Eloise
And so I take a drink
And spray the paint on the wall
A portrait of me by the phone named
Eloise please call
And I hear a whisper
I turn but I’ve missed her
The muscles in the hand
Don’t seem to understand
The lovely face of Eloise
And a million other boys
With brushes just like mine
Are searching in the paint
For the perfect rhyme
A song that I can't sing
The strangest dream

Summer rain fell on Col. Glenn
And made the hot asphalt shine
Wade was behind the wheel
I was there by his side
Memories that I lost
Dots I can’t connect
Are around the bend
On Col. Glenn
With the cause and effect

Head on into the sun
As we lost control
I was reaching for the door
As it began to fold
No I can't explain, change it or correct
What was lost as we got tossed
To the cause and effect

Blame it on the stars
Blame it on black ice
Blame it on the little mistakes
But fate still sets the price

Imagine a different day
Where it did not rain
Imagine if we’d never slid
Into the other lane
Imagine all you want
But it’s never what you expect
It's just a little life we share
With the cause and effect

Woman can you tell me
Tell me what this poor world needs
Man let the garden
Let the garden get consumed by weeds
You know that the snake is lying
In the tall grass tell me what he’s hiding

I’d ask god but he’s gone missing
Left that snake in the garden hissing
Tell me mama I promise to listen
Most of what I know I've learned from women

Woman can you tell me
What we've lost through compromising
Man set a fire
And wonders why the temperature’s rising
You know that we’re torn asunder
The rivers have swollen and we’re going under

Pick up that snake by his skinny lips
Give him a taste of the apocalypse
Shake up his world till the tables flip
Then turn up your music make his backbone slip

I wasn't concerned till now
I knew i’d survive somehow
Never cared much
I had no one to touch
I wasn't concerned till now

It never mattered before
If the enemy was outside my door
If locusts rained down
And covered the ground
It never mattered before
I never cared if the world was a mess.
Tell me what was I gonna do
My heart wasn't in till now
But until now there wasn't a you

I'm turning off all of the lights
My heart feels battered and bruised
I wasn’t concerned
If the world even turned
But until now there wasn’t a you

Jack Lee’s dead
Down kings road
In a field outside of town
I pulled the trigger
But your breath blew the bullet down

Here’s a rose
To show my love
They were growing ‘round his head
Blood on the stem
Proves that Jack is dead

You can trust me I’m the one
Feel how a bullet heats the barrel of a gun

No regrets lover girl
Spare me the surprise
I did what you asked
right between his eyes
Jack and coke spare the ice
But before we celebrate
Wrap your fingers ‘round the barrel and
Feel the heat escape

Silent night close your eyes
Watch it all go down
The knuckle squeezing back
The body hit the ground
Life’s a cheap paperback
We traded his for mine
You wrote a murder masterpiece
And I just read the lines

Dear songwriter
Did you take my muse
I know that crooked hat
She gave me one too
Maybe she gave up and walked away
Tired of me and the same chords I always play

Dear songwriter
You can have my pen
To make it write
Light a match and heat up the end
Press down hard, that use to work for me
Now I’m scarred where the hooks
Dug into my memory

I know you see her
I hear it in your songs
The melody destroys me
The harmonies are strong
And no cliches
Like ones i play
When she’s gone

Dear songwriter
When you see my muse
Tell her I want back all
The notebooks we used.
The worn out ones
That we filled with ghosts
The haunted ones that we would
Always use the most

You can keep that stupid hat
I never liked the way it sat
Besides the irony was lost on me.

Dear songwriter
When you lose your mind
I’ll take back all the things
That once were mine

It all starts with some small thing
Like a Goddamn bird with a song to sing
But one note sounds off to you
This is how the song turns blue

Then you feel the ground beneath you roll
Like a wave of heartbreak in your soul
You're desperate nothing to do
This is how the song turns blue

It flows through everything
A rumble or a whispering
Tangled up in brackish green
I make my own color scheme
So I can keep my heart beating

And the one-eyed judge flips the bird
As the cries for justice go unheard
Our leaders sound disturbed to you
This is how the song turns blue

And you hold a gun to the farmers head
So seeds of greed are grown instead
Instead of love so much to lose
This is how the song turns blue

Ignorance is an empty well
Where the dream we once shared fell
The hearts that know this to be true
Were the first to turn the song deep blue

I went up to the Tower of Song
I went inside but everyone was gone
Just a blue raincoat some blue suede shoes
I sat and watched the moon turn blue

It all starts with some small thing
A rumble or a whispering
Clear your throat listen for the cue
And sing along as the song turn blue