|
1. |
|
|
|
|
Draw the shutters, close the light
keep quiet as the moon stay out of sight
there's a man at the door he's calling her name
This isn't a joke this isn't a game
O Mother you're gone now we try to behave
We pretend in church we can't hear what they say
But when the sun goes down this town is changed
And men with drink come by calling your name
Sisters, sisters, stay out of the light
I know this man I know his plight
He stays up with Mother drinking whiskey
He snuck into my room once and kissed me
Mother, mother your daughters are alone
Oh mother, mother when will you come home?
It's a sweet little town on the cost of Maine
But we're too young to be alone this way.
|
|
2. |
|
|
|
|
Mama said trouble
Kills the bad parts of yourself
Well I'm afraid I might not
Have anything else left
I want to get tired
Of staring into the lights
I want to get tired
Of feeling all those eyes on me tonight
I hear a hush come on the crowd
They know I was sent for from out of town
And the ocean of the air
It hangs right there
Nobody out there is breathing
While I'm singing
Mama don't worry
About me on the road
Even trouble knows
You can't squeeze blood from a stone
It's nothing I ain't seen
Since I was a kid
If you got a fire
You sure don't keep it hid
I hear a hush come on the crowd
They know I was sent for from out of town
And the lights burn bright alright2
But tonight I shine brighter
And I reach out into my beginning
|
|
3. |
|
|
|
|
Look for me on the next train
Look for my letter in the night
Maybe it's just another contest
Maybe it's just another prize
Call me young call me restless
Forgive my playful little lies
Maybe I'm just another contestant
Or maybe I'm meant to be your prize
Everything we've got is put in one basket
It's filled with words I carry alone
walls closing in on this little cottage
no room to expand in this little home
Look for me in a daydream
Write me letters in the night
Maybe it's just another contest
Maybe I'm just another prize.
|
|
4. |
|
|
|
|
I'll take the field and forest
I'll take the sound
Of the sky to one ear,
One ear to the ground
Springtime
All hands reach to the sun
I will touch one hundred flowers
And not pick one
I will be the air
If you'll be the seed
I will carry you
If you will go where I lead
Summer wind carries us down these halls
Faster than we can run
I will knock at one hundred doors
And not enter one
If I escape you
Will you run after me?
If I come back to you tonight
Will you turn away from me?
We make our bed in these autumn leaves
The night sky above
I will light one hundred fires
I will give myself to love
I am most constant
When I am least true.
But the miles stretch between us,
It doesn't hurt like it used to.
We lie as seeds between
The winter snow and the stone
I will touch one hundred women
And still feel alone
|
|
5. |
|
|
|
|
After all these years to strike New York in braids.
It's an instant education all class and no grades.
Buildings everywhere a million stories high,
clothes hanging in the breeze, children rolling by,
And the noise, good God, you can see the noise.
After all these years to have you here with me,
Two girls from Maine, in the center of everything.
Windows everywhere, billboards way up high,
Smokestacks up above belching to the sky,
And the noise, good God, can you see the noise?
It takes some getting used to, all this excess profanity.
Welcome to Bohemia, here girls drink for free.
It's true there isn't quite enough to go around
But we'll make it through alright, you know I own this town
And the boys, oh God have you seen the boys?
|
|
6. |
|
|
|
|
I carry you
You carry her
She carries me
I carry you
You carry her
She carries me
I carry you
You carry her
She carries me
We are one part
Split into three
Maybe we'll drown in this whiskey river
Well down my angels down we go together
This one's wild
This one's crazy
This one's mean
This one's quiet
This one's shy
This one's free
This one's wild
This one's crazy
This one's mean
We are one part
Split into three
Maybe we'll escape the past forever
Well down my angels down we go together
Maybe we'll drown in this whiskey river
Down down down down down together
|
|
7. |
|
|
|
|
It's no good, it's no good to try and make me choose
Anyway you try to untie it will only tighten the noose
You take my legs and he takes my head. Right here on the couch you can take me to bed.
Or take pictures, or take pictures
I hear what you whisper to each other when you think I'm asleep
And I know what we do is not love though our love runs deep.
If you let me go you would know you that you both don't need me
But what would I be without us three? I'd be lost completely.
I didn't realize at first that this power was a curse that bleeds me
And what's worse, these words I rehearse, they no longer please me
Nothing to be done so we drink and we run in a threesome
And the audiences claps are like slaps I know they don't mean them
Cause I hear what they say across the cafes 'she's a demon'
And I've been drinking for two it's true, but it's a way to try and beat them
The voices that come in the night that say I'm washed up and done
And what will I be divided by three, less than one.
|
|
8. |
|
|
|
|
I was wrong,
I have seen beauty bare
But it cost me my captain,
My country, my everywhere
I have stolen days
When I had plenty days of my own
I was jealous and crazy
I was chasing these days into nights
I was a poet and we all say
Poets ain't quite right
I stole your pretty flowers
When I had pretty flowers of my own
Everything we planted is
Choking the light of the sun
If this is where the century is
You can send me back to the last one
I was heedless and willful
I saw the end from the beginning
You were beautiful and damned
And hardly any good at sinning
I told you when I met you
I'd only borrow your heart
Everything we planted is
Choking the light of the sun
If this is where the century is
You can send me back to the last one
|
|
9. |
|
|
|
|
Miles from here, out in the ocean.
We'll sleep all night and swim all day.
Not really a plan just a notion,
Of how to wash these things away
We'll get clean on Ragged Island,
We'll strip the layers down to our skin.
We'll wear no clothes on Ragged Island,
And we'll be lovers once again.
No more sick beds, no more syringes.
No more morphine dreams ahead,
You'll have your words and I'll have your smiling eyes,
We'll get these demons out of our heads
New York city was never the answer,
We both know Paris was a mistake,
Even Steepletop held us ransom,
We could never really get away.
We'll get clean on Ragged Island,
We'll watch the dirt just float away.
Drifting currents, lazy motion,
Naked bodies at play.
I'm not asking I'm telling you,
We have to kick this thing or it's the end.
There's nothing I love as much in this whole wide world
But I can't love you if you're dead.
We'll get clean on Ragged Island,
We'll strip the layers down to our skin.
We'll wear no clothes on Ragged Island,
And we'll be lovers once again.
|
|
10. |
|
|
|
|
You can't imagine how it feels
To take all that you can grasp
To come so close to you
Yet you escaped from my hands
Would that I were the arrow
That I were made of lead
I'd rather not shine above
A world where you are dead
O the power in these hands
To take all there is for taking
O the day has finally come
When there's nothing left worth saving
I look out on your leaves
Here with all that we've done
Your leaves will never fade
While mine wilt in the sun
So I climb the stairs
To take my chariot down
These, my fastest horses,
Lead without my hand now.
O the power in these hands
To take all there is for taking
O the day has finally come
When there's nothing left worth saving
|
Ten songs based on the life of poet Edna St.Vincent Millay. Each song is a scene from Millay's life, told in chronological order. All songs were written on February 21 2010.