DIAMONDS BACK TO COAL

I’ve been walking through the wasted streets
By the station and the old hotel
Between the gunman and his dirty sheets
Between sirens and the broken bell

I’ve been walking with this old blind fold
Along the edges of the endless road
Between the stars and the rusted cars
Looking for a little flash of gold

Is this the land the we borrowed?
Is this the land that we stole?
Who’s gonna be the fool tomorrow?
Who’s gonna try to play that role?
Turning diamonds back to coal

I’ve been walking through the hurricanes
Through the torches of the hate parades
Between the actress and the role she plays
Between the dogs and the shallow graves

I’ve been walking through a dead man’s town
Where the answers are all absurd
Between the pervert and his plastic crown
Between the hero and the gallows bird

Is this the land of bone and cinder?
Where they farm the GMO?
Who’s gonna be the next pretender?
Who’s gonna try to play that role?
Turning diamonds back to coal

FALLING MAN

Sometimes I feel like the falling man
Falling down through centuries
With no name, no place to be
Just a runner in an endless chase
Not winning but in the race
Trying not to fall out of history

Pictures moving at a million frames
Can’t tell the story right
I lay awake and dream at night
About the times when we lived in caves
With no gods, no souls to save
In the psychedelic waves of time

Falling man, falling man
Maybe one day you’ll understand

We had our own little paradise
Then we moved away from home
Started living in the great unknown
Knowing more and feeling less
New pain and modern stress
Moving through the crowd like we’re not alone

I’m out here where I don’t belong
I’m just a dollar in a paper town
I sit and watch the sun go down
Stuck in traffic like the old cave man
There’s no future for the falling man
When he falls out of frame, it makes no sound

Falling man, falling man
Maybe one day you’ll understand
Maybe one day you’ll land

STORY OF A FISH

Ain’t it hard when you find that time is so unkind?
It leaves you out in the cold with no one’s hand to hold

I’ll be your river, you be my sea

I’m a fool in school, a lonely molecule
Trying to swim through stone, I was born so far from home

I’ll be your river, you be my sea

And if you don’t where I’ve been,
then you won’t know who I am

Still we float unaware off where we go from here
Upstream, through the heart to find a counterpart

I’ll be your river, you be my sea

And if you don’t know where I’ve been,
then you won’t know who I am
Let’s swim together

WORRY DOLL

It’s getting near the end, said the paper to the pen
These words were once like towers, now their power’s wearing thin
The curtain’s on the ground and the cross is upside down
The crops are all abandoned and it’s gold rush in the town

Haley, won’t you wait around and see
Cause there might be something real inside a dream
It’s last call so be my worry doll
Down the road and up the hall, see what it brings
See what it brings

I’ve given everything, said the puppet to the string
I used to feel like dancing, now all I do is swing
The holy statue bleeds and the moon is in the weeds
The storm is growing closer, but now no one even sees

Haley, won’t you wait around and see
Cause there might be something real inside a dream
It’s last call so be my worry doll
Down the road and up the hall, see what it brings
See what it brings

I’m headed out the door, said the carpet to the floor
I can’t forget the bad times so I’ll leave them in the drawer
And every time I see that barn owl in the tree
I’ll say a prayer for Fernwood and toast what used to be

Haley, won’t you wait around and see
Cause there might be something real inside a dream
It’s last call so be my worry doll
Down the road and up the hall, see what it brings
See what it brings

LAUGHING WILLY

Hey laughing Willy, can I buy a smile?
The one in my head is broken, it’s been there for a while
You know I’m good for what I say
So hand it under the table and I’ll get you your pay

Is it me, or did the lights go dimmer than they used to be?
I came here when I was younger. Don’t you remember me?
Everything has changed in here but the ATM fees and the two dollar beer

Yeah, I heard about Maria, what a goddamn curse
Yeah, we all mess with fire but she got burned the worst
Hey, let’s change the subject now.
Let’s go to my car and lay the good one out

Hey laughing Willy, I can’t feel my face
I’m floating through the ceiling to some other place
The lights are beautiful out here
And the music of the afterworld is ringing in my ear
The music of the afterword is ringing in my ear

GREYHOUND

Greyhound, oh greyhound where’s my home today?
A pillow and a blanket and send me on my way

I press my head against the glass
Watch the fields and mountains pass
And the shadows they cast all along that yellow line

Greyhound, oh greyhound what’s my ticket say?
I’ve been sleeping in this station all since yesterday

We changed cars in Virginia
where the south, it fell down
You can still see the fight is lost all in these little towns

Greyhound, oh greyhound We’re all insomniacs
I don’t care where you take me, just don’t take me back

There’s a woman I thought I knew
Now I know that it’s not true
So I’m counting down my time all along that yellow line
Yes, I’m counting down my time all along that yellow line

GINA THE TRAMP

I walk on the left side of the road now
I cross the street when I see a light out
In the downtown abstract artifacts
Some pimp in the alley wants a handout

He looks at me in the dull, dark night
With his red eyes, cheap suit and cane
Telling me nothing I don’t know already
Like smoke from the sewers in the rain
Like smoke from the sewers in the rain

I’m a well dressed advertisement
For a company that closed it’s doors
Yeah there used to be a revolution
On the corner of 14th and 4th

Now it’s just a campaign of sadness
Between the buildings and the beggar’s trash
I don’t know what I saw in this city
But my mind is changing me fast
Yeah, my mind is changing me fast

I got some friends that are coming tonight
Yeah, the band’s been sounding real good
I guess it’s good to be back in my hometown
No one feels at home in this neighborhood

Do you remember Gina the tramp?
She made dream catchers out of old guitar strings
She sold them to all the adderall truckers
Pouring in from Colorado Springs
Yeah, she thought they were all highway kings

It was just some random night
At the Waffle House by the cemetery
Robo-trippers and candy-flippers
Hooking up with the apothecary

And the cops pulled a gun on a kid
I guess his car musta smelled like pot
They found a pipe in his glove compartment
Cuffed the black kid in the parking lot
Cuffed the black kid in the parking lot

Yeah, Gina was watching from the window
Behind a cigarette and smeared mascara
Her eyes were like a cold bus station
We spent that night with Jake and Sarah

And I always think about it
When I come back here, it’s true
I wonder how you can miss somebody
That you never even knew
That you never even knew

I walk on the left side of the road now
I got a rattle snake around my neck
And I’m a different person every day
But I’ve earned my self respect

There’s no moral and there’s no story
Just a busted out marquee light
And a world full of broken people
Where Gina’s nowhere in sight
Gina’s nowhere in sight

AHEAD, BEHIND

I hear people talking all the time
Telling lies, taking sides and plagiarizing lines
But my mind is in a place so far away
I don’t think I’ll be back again to answer them today

Don’t lose my love, don’t give it up
Don’t leave what’s ahead, behind

A neon sign is flashing vacancy
There’s shadows on the windows but there’s no one on the street
And the door is always open to my heart
Just down the crooked hallway where the walls fall apart

Don’t lose my love, don’t give it up
Don’t leave what’s ahead, behind

THE DREAM AND THE DREAMER

The dream and the dreamer, they fought like hell
They lived together in and old hotel
The dreamer wanted love, the dream wanted time
They ran out of both back in ’89

No one wants to leave behind what means the most
Sometimes you gotta walk away just to get close
Once I was dreamer, but dreams don’t last
Now I’m just a cartoon from the modern past

There’s fear in the schoolyard, fear in the church
But the fear on TV might kill us first
It gives the people nothing but these hollow themes
And the all night re-runs of our broken dreams

When the Mayflower landed, and the natives came
The dreamer got greedy, the dream took the blame
Now the land is dying and the sea is grey
While the dreamer drives his car on the native’s grave

I rent a place here on apocalypse drive
Where only dead things make it out alive
They put me in prison and they called it free
I lost my faith, my identity

Early in the morning till late at night
Neighbors say they still hear how they fuss and fight
The dream and the dreamer in that old hotel
We all hope it works out, we all wish them well
We all hope it works out, we all wish them well