I sit like a normal human being
Thinking that I won’t be seen.
A new threat of terror has just made the news
From people so desperate they have nothing to lose,
By drawing our attention to a violent deed
While the sanitized coverage won’t show the troops bleed.
I feel like I’m somewhere I don’t belong
Where I’ve lost all sense of right and wrong.
It seems that somehow I missed the boat,
Now I’m just trying to stay afloat.
I embrace the world with all its flaws
As I try to find a worthy cause,
Among all those who have found their place
In society’s ongoing rat race.
Like rats running through a man-made maze
Going nowhere with their mind ablaze
From a path followed with no reward,
We struggle, yet find ourselves ignored.
I dreamt about everything last night,
I awoke under a different light,
Wondering if my past could matter,
Feeling as if my dreams would shatter.
I’ve traveled to lots of places,
Looked into so many sad faces,
I feel I want to go underground
Where all of my secrets can’t be found.
The past is gone, the future not here,
Now is the time when fears disappear.
What is the sound of two hearts crashing?
Is it something like dolphins splashing?
They poured knowledge into my head
Without telling me where it led,
I hover at the edge of civilization,
Wondering what is the source of my indignation.
It’s just another crisis that made the news,
If it’s not a shortage of water, it’s children without shoes.
The pleasure industry is doing well
With all the illusions that are for sale.
Sometimes stuff happens that’s hard to understand,
Like when the time has come for you to play your hand,
And the salt in your sweat is stinging your eyes,
And you’re tired of reacting to the same old lies,
And of being asked what you’ve done for the planet today,
And you’re thinking of all your bills that the planet won’t pay,
But your fate is in your hands and you’re not finding peace of mind,
And you’re trying to do the right thing and you’re trying to be kind,
But when someone walks all over you just for being nice,
The next time someone asks you for a favor you start to think twice,
Before giving to a person not likely to reciprocate,
But ready instead to take from the next plate.
The trust in me is fading still,
From all that I want, all of my will.
A love born in the ashes of a relationship gone wrong,
I thought it would make a good subject for a song.
Can I explain why I have this desire
To let a woman set my heart on fire,
The craving coming with unknown cause
Perhaps relating to natural laws?
People are kind if they have enough time,
But it’s getting late and I’m running out of wine.
Did I fall into someone’s arms to feel the pain of our separation
Because these palpitations of the heart are a gift beyond explanation?
Even though I felt like enough was enough,
What kind of person disappears when the going gets rough?
Memories don’t wash away easily
Especially those that become your reason to be.
Is it easier to fall in love when your heart is broken?
Is that one of the truths that is rarely spoken?
Do you taste something you want to seek it again and again
Like in a game that starts over each time you win?
Adapting the kind of lukewarm stance that will keep you from getting hurt,
You give up on a path already taken, and lie down in the dirt.
Do I go around thinking about what other people think of me
Knowing that at the same time my self-image is based on what only I can see?
Do we do anything with all the information we store
Or do we unquestioningly prepare ourselves for more?
People struggle for a piece of fame
But end up dying just the same.
Sometimes it’s not about whether or not you win,
It’s about whether you get a chance to dance again.
Your material conditions have a way of defining your relations,
You need to transcend those to find deeper sensations.
Bad luck is a chance to observe what you wouldn’t have seen otherwise,
And groping in the dark at least leaves you with a sense of surprise.
On a train to nowhere I take a seat,
When all of a sudden I start to feel the heat.
Feeling washed out in waves of scorn,
Waiting for fresh thoughts to be born,
Breaking down the walls in my mind,
Seeking truths that are hard to find…
It’s getting late, too late to see
Beyond these walls in front of me.
I’m trapped among some old possessions,
Suffocated by untold confessions.
My life is like a question mark
As if I were groping in the dark,
For some kind of Holy Grail
Or something that would never fail.
I shut my eyes and I feel someone,
Or is just the setting sun,
Or is it the Earth turning away
Leaving the night its chance to play
With longings to satisfy a heart
That dreads to feel a world apart
From a careless and breathless smile
That leaves me helpless for a while?
As time passes, affections fade
Except the one divinely made,
The subject of nearly every song
That plays on the radio all day long.
How much repetition can you take
Until you want to see a window break?
But it’s what you plant that matters,
Not whether or not the glass shatters.
And then it’s about where the seed lands,
Would she draw me in with gentle hands?
I need a new reality today,
Is there one on sale to take me away?
Can a movie take me on a trip
That lets me forget I’m on a sinking ship?
Yet I’m in no mood for any relief
That requires me to adopt a belief
That a happy ending will ease my pain
Any more than a cheerful song will stop the rain.
I wonder if someone saved me a place
Or if I’ll disappear without a trace
Into the woods like a troubadour
Only to return when I want something more,
To share with others new perceptions
Of how to live without preconceptions.
My heart takes off in another direction,
It’s part of a process called natural selection,
Where I’m attracted to whatever makes me stronger,
Or to whatever might keep me around longer.
”You’re such a good kisser,” she said,
The words kept ringing in my head.
Of course the words weren’t directed at me,
But that didn’t keep me from fantasy.
Yet it’s time to move on, to find another shore,
To rediscover what it is I’m really living for.
Life gets confusing, sometimes I don’t know where I’m going,
Like when the sun shines and it feels as if it were snowing.
I just forge ahead, I really have no choice,
But to guess what’s right as I listen to my own voice.
I gaze at the stars and I feel a presence
That’s hard to define but strikes me in my essence.
How I got where I am I really can’t say,
But as the Earth spins, something blows me away.
I try to find meaning in all the world’s turmoil,
I hear cries of revolution as I sink my hands into the soil.
The Earth remains fundamentally unchanged in spite of all we do,
It’s a tribute to the planet’s resilience that the ocean is still blue.
What am I doing? Where have I been?
I can hear myself asking again and again.
What seemed so right to me not long ago
Now leaves me confused with nothing to show
For all the days I perspired in pursuit of a dream
That propelled me forward while residue floated downstream.
I must have been asleep for a long time to now feel so out of place
That I can’t begin to see how I fit into this human race.
The race to the top never ends, it only begins
When time starts vanishing and we’re forgiven our sins
For having wasted the very part of us we cherish the most,
The part that no one sees, that can haunt you like a ghost.
I feel ashamed of having played a game
Of looking outside myself for someone to blame
For all the thrills I seek I can’t seem to find,
It’s the craving within that alters the mind.
What happens in this world is between me and you,
The things that we like and those that we do
To understand each other and to have some fun
While making sure not to mistreat anyone.
All the unintended neglect is catching up to me
Sometimes the people who matter most are those we can’t see.
Along life’s winding path it’s easy to lose touch
With people who moved you and changed your life so much,
But straight lines cross never to meet again,
That’s why you need to turn inward to feel the truth within.
It’s time to shed some preconceptions and find a better way
To meet our everyday needs while leaving more time for play.
Capitalism is an abstraction that means nothing any more
As taxpayers bail out banks that are rotten to the core,
And other financial institutions are playing with your money
While politicians look the other way waiting for their taste of honey.
These are confusing times with newspapers shutting down,
And stores are closing their doors in your favorite part of town.
What do you believe, where do you find what’s true
As you struggle to find the energy to look out for you?
An energy crisis of a different kind
Is stressing out my body and fragmenting my mind.
All the colors that I see and the melodies that I hear,
And the rhythm that shakes me make me hesitate and fear
That words like these vanish like empty promises into the night,
As if my effort to share these thoughts just didn’t seem right.