Songs

Recently, I played my first "real" show, opening for Kimya Dawson, whose claim to fame was the Juno soundtrack (but who has, however, been around for much longer). We played at the Big Top Art Gallery on Clio Street. I had delayed getting my father to tune the piano, so it was a bit out of tune, which is much more noticeable in the recording than I expected! Several of my darling friends and listeners have asked me about the song lyrics, so I decided to post them here along with the link to the recording. I have very little experience with microphones, so singing into one so that everyone could decipher the lyrics was challenging and not fully successful! Here are the recording and lyrics, and maybe one day, I'll get around to actually naming my songs.

Link to recording

Song One
Some say I’ll never return to me
Have we all started swimming without any gills?
Paint me a box (I like espresso brown)
But I’ll take what I can get

They feed us honeycakes
Until we slow and obstruct
Until there’s not much more than moth-eaten cloth
See-through, breathe through
Blow it away

Fish lips cut off
Blood flow sucked dry
I’ve started building my own
Some say it’ll soon be gray

They inject air into us
Until we slow and obstruct
Until there’s not much more than inflation
Explosion
Bits and pieces blown by the wind

Pearls in my eyes
Salted tongue
Until it’s numb
Contaminated water
Surrounds, smothers
Fingers still twitching
But a twitch is a movement
The reach sticks close to me
But the grip around my throat
Has already imprinted
Yet the skin glitter fades away

Goldfish return to flesh
Doctor batters the pearls
And flicks the tongue
Until it moves
Look closely
See the breath

Song Two
On a boat ride
Mirror images
Across the sea
Shimmering like glass
I reach out
But you’re already vapor

Settling into my baby crib
Milk trickles down the walls
With the rock-rock motion
Spider hands reaching for me
Eyes shut
I wish, I wish, I wish
I was vapor, too

Bottom-dwelling I am
Scraping my fingers through
Wet dirt and crystals
Bones of ancient fish litter the ocean floor
Gray, green, black
I breathe through my gills
Shapeless, faceless
A mass of skin
I know I can find it
I know I can find it
Something shiny, something breathless
Shapeless, faceless
I begin to run
I search for you
Hiding, unborn

I know I will see
Golden fins when you, when I emerge
I know I will see
My fingers on your hands
I know I can find it
I know I can find it

Encircling into my arms
One and the same
I reach up to feel the form of my face

Song Three
They have red streaks
Ornamenting their faces
Around them glowing heaps
Of regenerating, recalculating bones
“Tip-toe” is the order
But we feel the taint
Seeping up through our toes
“Hold your nose” is the order
“Don’t look down” is the order
This is when childhood builds up inside
A scream: “Just look at my wings!”

Born Creator

This is Earth
Fed and full
Stains the color of bricks
Melt into the dirt
Stains the color of ivory
Hard and rigid
“Quick and quiet” is the order
“Swallow down good” is the order
As much as we cling to the edge of this cliff,
Our chests are brushing the ground

Born Digging

Hopeful projection of the fateful path
Holds removable thorns, petals in our mouths
An ongoing rumble that we can call celebration
But we hunch, we whisper
Eyes wide and upturned
The blazing reflection of others’ chosen future

Born Creator

Song Four
My skeleton is made of feathers
Easily dispersed
As the fires rattle and roar
Everyone else has their cages set high, untouched

And there are galaxies
Swirling about us
Waiting black eyes absorb the stars
Like vacuums, we are

The walls collapse around us
Cages suspended in the air
And the wind starts raging
But we still suck in all the worlds of endless impossibilities

Knives forced by invisible hands
Red ribbons of life force unraveling
Left floating and flying
Never dead

Serpent’s tongue
Lion’s roar
Slapping away with eagle’s wings
Then cradling you, my feathers in your teeth
As you claw for freedom
This is not the humanity you thought it’d be
Because this should have been the end

Song Five
Mine
Yet yours
My star
My steps to the heavens
My dream

All my weary traveling
Beaten, bruised
I cry out for you
By one

Mine
Yet yours
Sing me to sleep
My star