Won't say I love you, babe
Won't say I need you, babe
But I'm gonna get you, babe
And I will not do you wrong
Living's mostly wasting time
I waste my share of mine
But it never feels too good
So let's don't take too long
You're soft as glass
And I'm a gentle man
We got the sky to talk about
And the world to lie upon.

Days up and down they come
Like rain on a conga drum
Forget most, remember some
But don't turn none away
Everything is not enough
Nothing is too much to bear
Where you been is good and gone
All you keep is the gettin' there
To live is to fly
Low and high
So shake the dust off of your wings
And the sleep out of your eyes

It's goodbye to all my friends
It's time to go again
Think on all the poetry
And the pickin' down the line
I'll miss the system here
The bottom's low and the treble's clear
But it don't pay to think too much
On things you leave behind
I may be gone
But it won't be long
I will be a-bringin' back the melody
And the rhythms that I find

We all got holes to fill
Them holes are all that's real
Some fall on you like a storm
Sometimes you dig your own
But choice is yours to make
And time is yours to take
Some dive into the sea
Some toil upon the stone
To live is to fly
Low and high
So shake the dust off of your wings
And the sleep out of your eyes
So shake the dust off of your wings
And the tears out of your eyes




by Townes Van Zandt

now I always used to be last to the table
I think I heard someone say, 'I didn't know Tom Mayne was disabled?'
and though I can tell you I didn't give a fuck
it's hard when even a hooker won't give you a second look
but now I can shout on a Japanese tram
because I'm on a Runaway Pram

now I'm not saying that girls were to me a closed book
but let's just say I got them to "open up".
the words that I read when I spread those pages wide -
Good G-d! even the straightest man would have died.
I no longer hold my finger in the dam
cos I'm on a Runaway Pram

time's getting faster because less and less is new
and the only thing that leaves you moved is when yr bowels move
you're wasting 19 hours of the 20 hour day
and the other 30 minutes it slips away
I used to give a dime, now I don't give a damn
because I'm on a Runaway Pram

ever had the feeling that you're outside life?
no fruit, no death, no Russian mail-order wife.
I was more invisible than the Invisible Man -
at least he had a balaclava and blue gloves on his hands;
my life up to then had been such a sham
but now I'm on a Runaway Pram





by David Cronenberg's Wife

I had shoes full of holes
When you first took me in.
I had calluses, not sores,
And I'd like to keep them
So go turn those sheets
Get back on the street
There's nothing more I can bring to you
See, I'm scared of the door
Afraid of the floor

Well, I'll go and walk right through
And I'll show you
Who I've been running from

It's the feeling of waking
And it's gone.

A cry for help, a hint of anaesthesia
The sound from broken homes
We used to always meet here
As he lays asleep she takes him in her arms
"Some things I have to do
but I don't mean you harm"

A worried parent's glance, a kiss, a last goodbye
Hands him the bag she packed, the tears she tried to hide
A cruel wind that bows down to our lunacy
And leaves him standing alone here
In this colony

Dear G-d in His wisdom took you by the hand
G-d in His wisdom made you understand
In this colony




by Ian Curtis

Take a little walk underneath the bridge
And climb across the tracks
Where the vermin skulk aboriginal
As they rut and crap;
On the graveyard shift come a tall, mincing man
In a greasy, black coat
With a pink Bic pen

You see him at the Morgue, my friends
You'll see him in your dreams
He'll add you on Facebook
But he ain't what he seems;
(Over London Bridge flow a long line of suits
Coughing sighing drifting)
"Exterminate the brutes"


In the gathering mist
Stands a tall, handsome man
Marking tags on the bodies
With a pink Bic pen




by se1fish

If we're talking about love
Then I have to tell you
Dear readers, I'm not sure where I'm headed
I've gotten lost before
I've woke up stonedrunk
Face down in the floor

Late afternoon, the house is hot
I started, I jumped up
Everyone hates a bore
Everybody hates a drunk

This may be a lit invention
Professors muddled in their intent
To try to rope in followers
To float their malcontent
As for this reader,
I'm already spent

Late afternoon, the house is hot
I started, I jumped up
Everyone hates a sad professor
I hate where I wound up

Dear readers, my apologies
I'm drifting in and out of sleep
Long silence presents the tragedies
Of love. Note the age. Get afraid
The surface hazy with attendant thoughts
A lazy eye metaphor on the rocks

Late afternoon, the house is hot
I started, I jumped up
Everyone hates a bore
Everybody hates a drunk
Everyone hates a sad professor
I hate where I wound up
I hate where I wound up


by R.E.M. {Buck/Mills/Stipe}

Look, blood, I'm tellin ya
you've kept us waitin rand too fucken long
All we wanted was kebab and chips
tell me, where did it go wrong?

We sweated meat juice in the
negro streets at dawn of night time
whilst we stared at hookers selling their pathetic
bodies at a fiver a time

a blind street child lay by the side of the kerb
bootleg whisky in his hand
He smelt of piss and was stained in faeces
you'd have needed to see it to understand

I mean, man..he'd been smokin rock out of a
plastic penguin. I'm tellin ya
But as I handed him his rocks I said
D'you know, this is the good shit I'm sellin ya

I saw God's face in a pool of blood on the bonnet of a BMW
and, yea, I wept
I wanted to tell you, I wanted to tell him
but knew it was a secret best kept.



by the unnamed songwriting duo soon to be hailed as the new Simon & Garfunkel

The sky is blue and all the leaves are green
The sun's as warm as a baked potato
I think I know precisely what I mean
When I say it's a shpadoinkle day

And as I ride with my girl
She's my best friend in the whole world!
We'll move along, set our goals high
With eyes full of hope as we aim for the

Sky is blue and all the leaves are green
My heart's as full as a baked potato
I think I know precisely what I mean
When I say it's a shpadoinkle day!
When I say it's a happy-go-moinkaly lucky shpadoinkle-dee-day!



(Reprise)

It's a long, long way for us to go,
But if we don't try we'll never know.
Stay optimistic, set our goals high
There's nothing we can't do if we aim for the

Sky is blue and all the leaves are green
The air's as pure as a baked potato
We think we know exactly what we mean
When we say it's a shpadoinkle day
When we say it's a shpadoinkle day



from Cannibal! The Musical by Trey Parker and Matt Stone

I was down in Georgia
nothing was as real
as the street beneath my feet
descending into air

The cauldron was a-bubbling
the flesh was lean
and the women moved forward
like piranhas in a stream
they spread themselves before me
an offering so sweet
and they beckoned and they beckoned
come on darling eat

Eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat
you eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat

They circled around me
natives in a ring
and I saw their souls a-withering
like snakes in chains
and they wrapped themselves around me
mmm what a treat
and they rattled their tales hissin'
come on let's eat

Eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat
you eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat

I felt a rising in my throat
the girls a-saying grace
and the air the viscous air
pressed against my face
and it all got too damn much for me
just got too damn rough
and I pushed away my plate
and said boys I've had enough
and I laid upon the table
another piece of meat
and I opened up my veins to them
and said come on eat

Eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat
you eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat
you eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat
you eat the summer cannibals
eat eat eat

Cause I was down in Georgia
nothing was as real
as the street beneath my feet
descending into hell

So eat eat eat
you eat eat eat
you eat eat eat
eat eat eat



by Patti Smith

[there's also a short story called 'Summer Cannibals' by the mighty J.G. Ballard, incidentally]

Go to sleep, go to sleep
Go to sleepy, little baby

When you wake, ride away
All the pretty little horses
Black and Gray, Sorrel and Bay
Whole heap o' little horses

So hushaby, don' you cry
Go to sleepy, little baby

Way down yonda', down in the medder
Lies a poor little lambie
Bees an' the butterflies peckin' out his eyes
Poor little thing is cryin' Mammy

Go to sleep, don' you cry
Rest your head upon the clover
Rest your head upon the clover

In your dreams you shall ride
While your Mammy's watching over
Blacks and Bays and Dapples and Grays
All the pretty little horses
All the pretty little horses



[traditional, Appalachian, roughly as performed by Kristin Hersh and Nick Cave & Current 93]

I see you on the cover of Rolling Stone
or one of those other corny music magazines
that's just an excuse to sell fashion
or bullshit but occasionally sticks in a good writer or political story so
at the board meeting they can ease their conscience
that the majority of their readership has the IQ of
well...
a Creed fan.

So you pucker your mouth and you show lots of thigh
coy celebrity sexy
teasing cleavage
Ass in the air
selling your product
down on your knees
why so shy?

Cause you stand for nothing really
you got nothing to say
it's insulting
your pretense of integrity
Take the movie's name
tattoo it on your labia
spread your legs for the camera
what difference would it make?
I mean, fuck it, why go halfway?

So you think you might be Jesus, let's be frank,
you're the lead singer of a big rock band.
Let's get the bass player to nail you to a cross
long rusty spikes
right through your hands.

You're a world leader with your finger on the button,
thinking that history is smiling on you.
Blow the shit out of everybody that doesn't agree
Do it in the name of patriotism, what else should you do?
I mean, fuck it, why go halfway?

I'm a self-righteous prick
with a great big mouth
but I'm sick
to death
of mediocrity and lies
and I'm preaching to the choir
and I'm yelling down a hole

I used to sing between the lines but then I got wise.



by Ed Hamell
(Hamell on Trial)

I woke up this mornin' with the sundown shinin' in.
I found my mind in a brown paper bag, but then I tripped on a cloud, fell eight miles high
I tore my mind on a jagged sky

I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in

I pushed my soul in a deep dark hole and then I followed it in
I watched myself crawling out
as I was crawling in
I got up so tight I couldn't unwind
I saw so much
I broke my mind

I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in

Somebody painted APRIL FOOL in big black letters on a dead end sign
I had my foot on the gas as I left the road and blew out my mind
Eight miles out of Memphis and I got no spare
Eight miles straight-up, downtown, somewhere

I just dropped in to see what condition my condition was in


(Yeah, yeah, oooh yeaaa-aaaa-ah)



by Newberry, performed by Kenny Rogers & the First Edition (duude! talk about a cash-in on the psychedelic explosion...)
and by Nick Cave & Die Haut on the album 'Headless Body in a Topless Bar'

When I look out into your eyes out there
When I look out into your faces
You know what I see?
I see a little bit of Elvis
In each and every one of you out there

Lemme tell ya...
Welllllll...

Elvis is everywhere
Elvis is everything
Elvis is everybody
Elvis is still the King

Man, O man
What I want you to see
Is that the big E's
Inside of you and me

Elvis is everywhere, man!
He's in everything.
He's in everybody...

Elvis is in your jeans
He's in your cheesburgers
Elvis is in Nutty Buddies!
Elvis is in your mom!

He's in everybody
He's in the young, the old,
the fat, the skinny,
the white, the black
the brown and the blue
people got Elvis in 'em too

Elvis is in everybody out there.
Everybody's got Elvis in them!
Everybody except one person that is...
Yeah, one person!
The evil opposite of Elvis.
The Anti-Elvis

Anti-Elvis got no Elvis in 'em,
Lemme tell ya.

Michael J. Fox has no Elvis in him.

And Elvis is in Joan Rivers
but he's trying to get out, man!
He's trying to get out!
Listen up Joanie Baby!

Elvis is everywhere
Elvis is everything
Elvis is everybody
Elvis is still the king

Man, O man
What I want you to see
Is that the big E's
Inside of you and me

Man, there's a lot of unexplained phenomenon
out there in the world.
Lot of things people say
What the heck's going on?

Let me tell ya!

Who built the pyramids?
ELVIS!
Who built Stonehenge?
ELVIS!

Yeah, man you see guys
walking down the street
pushing shopping carts
and you think they're talking to allah,
they're talking to themself.
Man, no they're talking to ELVIS!
ELVIS! ELVIS!

You know whats going on in that Bermuda Triangle?
Down in the Bermuda Traingle
Elvis needs boats.
Elvis needs boats.
Elvis Elvis Elvis
Elvis Elvis Elvis
Elvis needs boats.

Aahh! The Sailing Elvis!
Captain Elvis!
Commodore Elvis it is.

Yeah man, you know people from outer space,
people from outer space they come up to me.
They don't look like like Doctor Spock.
They don't look like Klingons,
all that Star Trek jive.

They look like Elvis.
ELVIS!
Everybody in outer space looks like Elvis.
Cause Elvis is a perfect being.
We are all moving in perfect peace and harmony towards Elvisness

Soon all will become Elvis.
Everything everywhere will be Elvis.
Why do you think they call it evolution anyway?
It's really Elvislution!
Elvislution!

Elvis is everywhere
Elvis is everything
Elvis is everybody
Elvis is still the king

Man, O man
What I want you to see
Is that the big E's
Inside of you and me

That's right ladies and gentlemen,
The time has come!
Time has come to talk
To that little bit of Elvis inside of you.

Talk to it!
Call it up!
Say "Elvis, heal me!"
"Save me, Elvis!"
"Make me be born again
in the perfect Elvis light"

That's right!
You've got that Elvis inside of ya
and he's talkin to ya
He says he wants you to sing!
Everybody's got to sing like the king!

Like the king
Get that leg going now
Get your lip too.
Not no fool Billy Idol lip either
Everybody!
Yeah, we're rockin now!

Elvis is with us.
He's with us and he's speaking to us.
He says "Peoples!"
"Peoples!"
"Everybody!"
"Everybody got to sing!"

Elvis is everywhere
Elvis is everything
Elvis is everybody
Elvis is still the king

Man, O man
What I want you to see
Is that the big E's
Inside of you and me

Elvis is everywhere
Elvis is everything
Elvis is everybody
Elvis is still the king

Man, O man
What I want you to see
Is that the big E's
Inside of you and me

Elvis!



by Mojo Nixon