Carrion Crow
The English developed an intense hatred of crows and hunted them mercilessly, due to the birds’ habit of following soldiers into battle, as gulls follow fishing boats. This was bad for morale. Thanks to Lorre Wyatt for the last line of the last verse.
Chorus:
We have to feed the carrion crow, carrion crow, carrion crow
We have to feed the carrion crow, he doesn’t like to go hungry.
He’s always there when trouble begins
He’ll sit and stare and wait to dig in
He doesn’t care who loses or wins
As long as he doesn’t go hungry.
Chorus
He loves the sound of guns in the night
Mothers who scream and brothers who fight
He’ll have a feast as soon as it’s light
Then he won’t have to go hungry.
Chorus
Rich or poor he never can tell
If your soul’s gone to heaven or if it’s in hell
He only knows you’ve got a sweet smell
Now he won’t have to go hungry.
Chorus
We fight disease so people won’t die
Work for peace so bullets won’t fly
But still he gets a steady supply
We never let him go hungry.
Chorus
Give My Bones to Greyhound
I have no idea where the idea for this song came from. Once it started, it kept rolling downhill, and I couldn’t find the brakes.
I am the restless kind, I have a traveling mind
I never can unwind unless I’m moving
When I start feeling down, I head right out of town
I will not hang around to try improving.
Like Engine Number nine, I rumble down the line
To leave my cares behind, I do not need ’em
I don’t have any roots, I don’t have any suits
Just one pair of boots and lots of freedom.
Chorus:
When I die don’t make me rest in peace
I only want to fly just like the wild geese
Let my soul rock and roll
Down by the axle grease
Give my bones to Greyhound.
Someday I’ll bite the dust, like everybody must
But I won’t sit and rust like an old jalopy
When I run out of breath I will not take my rest
A little thing like death will never stop me.
So throw me in a box, just like a pile of rocks
Put in a pair of socks for stormy weather
Then to the station go and stow me down below
I’ll ramble to and fro forever.
Chorus
This Old Car
In memory of a 1986 Tercel that I thought would last forever until, one day, it didn’t. Luckily, I was wearing my seat belt.
This old car seen better days
It traveled far, back roads and highways
It moved so fast had a sparkling shine
That couldn’t last all this time.
This old car once had a smile
That seemed to grow with every mile
So full of cheer, so full of trust
But through the years it turned to rust.
This old car belching smoke
Stumbles past, people choke
Say “That’s not a car, it’s just a joke”
Did they think it’s always been this broke.
This old car remembers nights
Of shooting stars and turned-off lights
A couple kids with mussed-up hair
Where did they go, that lovely pair.
This old car seen better days
It traveled far, back roads and highways
It moved so fast had a sparkling shine
That couldn’t last all this time.
After the Fire
Written on the first anniversary of 9/11.
After the fire the tears fell like rain
Where tall trees had stood there was nothing but pain
A forest of green was turned into ash
The world that we knew disappeared in a flash.
After the fire we gathered around
Searching for signs of life on the ground
The earth looked so bare, as dead as can be
But something was there that nobody could see.
Slowly a seed under our feet
Started to stir, woken up by the heat
It sent down a root to help it hold tight
It sent up a shoot to reach for the light.
Seedlings will grow, trees will stand tall
Though we’ll always know how far they can fall
But nothing can kill the will to survive
After the fire there is so much alive.
I Need You (Paul Kaplan and Lisa Kleinholz)
Line one is adapted from the traditional ballad “I Loved a Lass,” a.k.a. “The False Bride” or “The Lambs on the Green Hills.”
I was shipwrecked in the forest
Until you came along
All the world was talking backwards
Until I heard your song
Until I heard your song.
Chorus:
I need you like a foot needs a shoe
My soul is all worn through
I need you.
I would climb the highest mountain
Or swim the widest sea
I would even stay right here
If you’d stay right here with me
If you’d stay right here with me.
Chorus
We are naked when we come here
And naked when we go
In-between we need protection
From wind and rain and snow
From wind and rain and snow.
Chorus
So I Could Get to You
In honor of all my ancestors who did what they had to do to grow up, reproduce and make sure at least one child reached adulthood. Not an easy thing to do, then or now.
My mother cried, my mother moaned, so early one midsummer’s morn
And with one final heaving groan to her a child was born
She suckled me upon her breast and she and Dad did all the rest
To ready me to leave the nest so I could get to you.
Chorus:
So I could get to you, my love
No road too long, no sea too rough
For I was made of sterner stuff
So I could get to you.
I found that life is just a play, you strut and fret upon the stage
You learn the lines you have to say and try to act your age
I was sometimes up and sometimes down and sometimes I went ’round and ’round
But I escaped the lost and found so I could get to you.
Chorus
In hurricanes with crashing trees, in thunderstorm and winter gale
A steady voice was telling me to stay upon your trail
Through drifting snow and sheets of ice I kept my eyes on paradise
As I used every known device so I could get to you.
Chorus
And when at last I saw you there, holding out your valentine
I shrank with fear and would not dare to cross the borderline
I was stumbling blind without a guide when something moved me deep inside
To leap across the great divide so I could get to you.
Chorus
And now that we have joined our fate, we’re touching deep within the heart
Though sometimes we must separate we’ll never be apart
And as I stand beneath the sun and think of what I’ve lost and won
I thank my stars for all I’ve done so I could get to you.
Chorus
If You Would Care for Me
I am proud to be accompanied on this song, and elsewhere on this album, by the next generation of musicians, showing us their formidable chops.
If you would care for me
The way I care for you
How simply simple life would be
If you would love me too.
The stars that shine so bright
Could never match the face
That fills my dreams with silver light
Then leaves without a trace.
Over and over you say hello
And then you walk away
Forever and ever you never will know
How much I wish you’d stay.
The skies that now are grey
Would turn to brilliant blue
If you would turn to me and say
You feel the way I do.
Take out the Garbage When You Go
Many thanks to the chorus, consisting of: Mary Annis, Shirley Conant, Elizabeth Farnsworth, Joe Hynes, Liam Hynes, Jeff Lee, Doug Plavin, Sianna Plavin, Asia Seager and Rico Spence.
You tell me that you’re leaving
That our love has lost its glow
Though you were once my Juliet
And I your Romeo
But before you break my heart in two
There’s one last thing that you can do
Take out the garbage when you go.
Chorus:
Take out the garbage when you go
It’s an awful lot to ask of you, I know
But these filthy bags could spread disease
So I’m begging you on bended knees to
Please, please, please, please
Please, please, please, please, please
Take out the garbage when you go.
You saved every reminder
Of the good times that we shared
The bananas that we peeled
The apples that we pared
You say our love’s gone sour
But I think it’s just the cauliflower
I gave you once to let you know I cared.
Chorus
Now we’re standing in the doorway
To say our last farewells
My eyes are filled with tears
My house is filled with smells
Our love was sweet as lobster meat
The kind you always used to eat
Well, now’s your chance to throw away the shells.
Chorus
Princes of Maine
The story of The Cider House Rules, in five verses.
There’s a heart that is weak
But it goes on and on
Never missing a beat
For the spirit is strong.
And the ones who make the rules
Never feel the pain
Not like the kings of New England
Not like the princes of Maine.
There’s a woman in love
But she can’t stand to wait.
While the powers above
Are deciding her fate.
And the ones who make the rules
Never crash their planes
Not like the kings of New England
Not like the princes of Maine.
When you bring in the crop
Every hand has a use
If an apple should drop
Then you squeeze it for juice.
And the ones who make the rules
Never stumble through the rain
Not like the kings of New England
Not like the princes of Maine.
And the knife it can heal
And the knife it can kill
When your life gets too real
Sometimes blood has to spill.
And the ones who make the rules
Never cut their veins
Not like the kings of New England
Not like the princes of Maine.
Take some glass that is rough
Throw it down in the sand
When it’s rounded enough
Bring it home in your hand.
And the ones who make the rules
Never seem to change
Not like the kings of New England
Not like the princes of Maine.
Good night you kings of New England
The Halls of a Hospice
“The Streets of Laredo,” from which I borrowed the tune in 1988, derives from the English “The Unfortunate Rake,” which, I later discovered, has such verses as:
“And had she but told me before she disordered me,
Had she but told me of it in time,
I might have got pills and salts of white mercury,
But now I'm cut down in the height of my prime.”
One night as I walked down the halls of a hospice
I saw a young man with a deadly disease
“Come sit down beside me,” he called from his bedroom
I sat down beside him to give his heart ease.
He said “When I was younger I felt like a stranger
Whatever I tried it was always the same
I came to New York unaware of the danger
Just like a moth who is drawn to the flame.
“I went to the places where men find each other
I felt like myself for the very first time
I sought after pleasure and now-and-then treasure
For that I’ve been sentenced to die in my prime.
“That TV evangelist says I deserve it
He says that I’m paying the wages of sin
But if it is suffering that makes us more holy
I’ll meet him in heaven, if he can get in.
“Tonight my dark cloud will crawl in through the window
To carry me off on a journey unknown
But there is a shining on that dark cloud’s lining
From people like you and the kindness you’ve shown.
“So go to the window and see that it’s open
Then take this farewell to my family and friends
Tell them I loved them much more than I showed them
And ask them to think of me now and again.”
As soon as the last of his words was delivered
The young man lay back, for to rest his poor bones
I opened the window and silently shivered
For I suddenly knew I was there all alone.
One night as I walked down the halls of a hospice....
I Can’t Remember Wintertime
Written in the south of France in the summer of 1985. On a wall near Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris is a memorial plaque for a partisan who fell on that spot. Even in 2002 the vase above the plaque contained fresh flowers. The tune was inspired by Robert Schumann’s “Ich Grolle Nicht” (I bear no grudge).
July is here, it’s filling all the beaches
With laughing kids so innocent and free
And virgin lovers eating figs and peaches
And tired old men like you and me
And tired old men like you and me.
And as we sit beside each other
Your body frail, the same as mine
I can’t believe you’re not my brother
I can’t remember wintertime
I can’t believe you’re not my brother
I can’t remember wintertime.
Last night we held our yearly celebration
The one your people call “Tag der Bastille”
Again I cursed the years of Occupation
A wound that time has yet to heal
A wound that time has yet to heal.
But as we sit beside each other
Your memories dark, the same as mine
I can’t believe you’re not my brother
I can’t remember wintertime
I can’t believe you’re not my brother
I can’t remember wintertime.
Our fathers met upon the field of slaughter
And you and I repeated history
I pray these children playing in the water
Will never know such misery
Will never know such misery.
And as we sit beside each other
Your dreams of peace, the same as mine
I can’t believe you’re not my brother
I can’t remember wintertime
I can’t believe you’re not my brother
I can’t remember wintertime.
Christmas morn
Written in 1985, for a Christmas show at the Bottom Line that Christine Lavin was organizing, that never quite materialized. Normally, Christine is unstoppable. I suspect FBI involvement.
A child was born, it was on Christmas morn
Who could know what he’d grow up to be
His mother she loved him and thought the world of him
The year was zero, BC
Up in the heavens a star did appear
To show us the way to the end of our fear
We gathered together from far and from near
That marvelous child to see
That marvelous child to see.
A child was born, it was on Christmas morn
Two thousand and two, AD
His mother was poor and the wolf at the door
Said “Your baby is coming with me.”
Up in the heavens the Star Wars begin
And the warlords get fatter while the children get thin
Then the door slowly opens, the wolf slouches in
Oh where can the wise men be
Oh where can the wise men be.
A child was born it was on Christmas morn
Who could know what he’d grow up to be.
The Joke
Written in 1969, shortly after a stranger aimed a knife at my heart. Luckily my arm got in the way.
(Wide version—thin version below)
I stared into the darkness, I could not see a thing
I whispered am I all alone, no one was answering
And when I turned to exit from the scene of my distress
I was flattened like a light bulb by the Seventh Avenue Express.
I went into the forest and sat upon a stone
I figured that I finally had found a steady home
But the soil started slipping and my rock fell to the sea
And I landed on a rooftop in another century.
I was standing on a corner when a man came up and said
That everything alive today is part of something dead
And knowing I could prove him wrong I kept my self control
But when I spoke he saw the joke and he shot me through the skull.
I stood before the mirror, I saw my picture there
And I watched myself grinning as I combed my thinning hair
And I asked my reflection am I different from all the rest
Nobody replied to me but the pounding in my breast
Nobody replied to me but the pounding in my breast.
Vacation Time
Doug is playing with brushes on a huge, empty lard can which he picked up on Swan’s Island, Maine, coincidentally just across the water from where my family spends our vacation each summer.
No mail, no phone, no thoughts of home
Removed, remote, out in a boat
Vacation time.
No rat, no race, no train to chase
Take off my shoes, shake off the blues
Vacation time, vacation time.
Laze away the day, slower than a gin fizz
If I don’t make hay tell me what the sin is.
These fish won’t bite but that’s all right
I guess they’ve gone somewhere to spawn
Vacation time, vacation time, vacation time.
No mail, no phone, no thoughts of home
Don’t write, don’t call until the fall
Vacation time, vacation time, vacation time
Vacation time.
The Leaving of Liverpool (traditional)
In which a Russian/German-American plays a Puerto Rican cuatro and a Chinese harmonica on a song about an English city, learned from Irishmen. One of many Clancy Brothers songs that Bob Dylan adapted (“Farewell”).
Oh, I’m bound away to leave you
Goodbye my love, goodbye
And there’s just one thing that grieves my mind
That’s leaving you behind.
Chorus:
So it’s fare thee well my own true love
When I return united we will be.
It’s not the leaving of Liverpool that grieves me
But my darling when I think of thee.
Oh I’m bound for California
By way of stormy Cape Horn
And I will send you a letter, love
When I am homeward bound.
Chorus
Oh I’m bound on a Yankee clipper ship
Davy Crockett is her name
And Burgess is the captain of her
And they say she’s a floating shame.
Chorus
It’s my second trip with Burgess on the Crockett
And I think I know him well
If a man is a sailor he can get along
But if not then he’s sure in hell.
Chorus
Oh, the sun is on the harbor, love
And I wish I could remain
For I know it will be a long, long time
Before I see you again.
Chorus
Love Is a Hard Thing to Find
Thanks to Jordan Kaplan. I used some of his ideas for the flute part.
Love is a hard thing to find
Easy to lose your mind,
Easy to lose your mind.
We flew so high from the start
Only to fall apart,
Only to fall apart.
My life was neatly arranged
Then it changed,
Then it changed.
The sea longs to hold solid land
Only to break on sand,
Only to break on sand.
Love is a hard thing to find,
Easy to lose your mind
Easy to lose your mind
Easy to lose….
Underneath the Stars Above
I wrote this when I was attending the Cornelia Street Songwriters’ Exchange in Greenwich Village in the nineteen-eighties.
If hand didn’t rhyme with understand
If moon didn’t rhyme with June
If I love you didn’t rhyme with true
I’d have no tune to croon.
If dance didn’t rhyme with romance
No one could write songs of love
Then what on earth would we sing about
Underneath the stars above.
We’d have to sing about physics
Or maybe a laundromat
But nobody here would shed a tear
For something as silly as that.
Imagine a lovely chanteuse
On stage at the cabaret
Milking the crowd for all they’re worth
With a song about tooth decay.
But desire always kindles a fire
The heart always knows from the start
Heavenly bliss comes with a kiss
And nothing can pull them apart.
For all these words were invented
To fit like a hand in a glove
Every time we need a rhyme
Underneath the stars above.
As Through This World I Go
Inspired by a trumpet quartet I heard at Kinhaven Music School, where my daughter Siena spent four blissful summers.
My dear companion strong and free
I wonder if you know
How much your friendship means to me
As through this world I go.
Before my flowing tears have dried
From one more bitter blow
You’re always standing by my side
As through this world I go.
And when the storm clouds disappear
And all the sky’s aglow
Your kindness keeps me in the clear
As through this world I go.
When ever we get pulled apart
To wander to and fro
I hold you here within my heart
As through this world
As through this world
As through this world I go.