Terrace, Song Lyrics

Terrace

In my Fitzroy terrace the floorboards creak,

In the kitchen the lean-to leaks,

It's been raining for a week,

You're not here to make my floorboards creak.

I'm staring out at the Melbourne rain,

Will I see you again?

Staring out at the Melbourne rain,

Will I see you?

The bed where we have lain,

The mirror where you were vain,

Beside the door a leadlight pane,

But all that knocks is the Melbourne rain.

So I'm staring out at the Melbourne rain, 

Will I see you again?

Staring out at the Melbourne rain,

Will I see you?

(chorus)

It was your house then I moved in.

We lived together in joyous sin.

Your stuff's still here, it all looks the same,

But the rooms ring empty when I scream . . . your name.

Pull on my old woollen beanie,

Catch a tram into Pellegrini's.

Strong hot coffee and I talk with strangers.

I feel better, but nothing changes.

Just staring out at Bourke Street at the pouring rain,

Will I see you again?

Staring out at the Melbourne rain,

Will I see you?

Parkstreet

Ko-Fi

The Ghost Of Richard Brautigan

Last night the American Gothic cathedral that is Richard Brautigan visited me in my sleep. With the enchantment of his words he turned me into a watermelon and floated me across the Pacific Ocean. 

Together we walked around the Haight Ashbury. Well, I walked, he floated. We both tried our darndest to love the tourist trash that now own that sacred ground. He took me back in time, showed me his apartment, where he worked, where he refused to do anything but what his talent demanded. I understood.

We walked and floated in silence, the silence of ourselves. At first I was a little disappointed, being in the company of the great writer I was expecting to see words glistening in the California sun like trout in a stream, occasionally leaping into the air for the sheer delight of jumping. I would have been happy if he'd just shown me a sign, the words "trout stream this way". I guess I was hoping to impress him, surface like a whale and blow him away with a salty spout of cleverness, but I felt that no words was part of the lesson.

He showed me a woman so beautiful that she caused traffic accidents wherever she went. I understood.

As morning approached his words turned my blood into wine, bottled me and sent me home. I awoke with the taste of California on my lips, and the only words that he spoke out loud all night whispering in my mind.

"Find your place, then live in it."

I understood. Trout stream this way.





Parkstreet

Ko-fi

Wayne Thiebaud, lithograph, 1994

Trout Fishing In America

Bigger Than Lincoln’s

O Captain!

Not my Captain!

There’s static

On the wheelhouse radio,

All the old man hears 

Is threats.

He pulls his whistle madly,

O the piteous tweets,

And swears he’ll crash

The ship of state 

Unless we all agree

His shores a-crowding

Are bigger

Than Lincoln’s.

Parkstreet

Ko-Fi

A Brief History Of Time

Big Bang
Toast or cereal?
Heat death

Parkstreet

Ko-Fi

Transient

Escalator

From underground platform

To daylight.

Pretty girl smiles,

Passing,

From daylight

To underground platform.

A marriage,

‘til death do us part.

Transient love.

Parkstreet

Just To See What Happens

Anaesthetised

With booze brewed

In a cell toilet.

Tattooed

With ink

Made from a melted plastic Coca Cola bottle.

Punched in with a paper clip,

By an artist inspired by hate.

Paid for with cigarettes

Or blow jobs.

His face 

And head

A miniature canvass

Of banal black blotches.

The birth marks

Of an alcoholic womb,

The scar tissue

Of prison rape.

He took his prison bars with him,

On his face and head,

And sat them opposite me

On this inner city tram,

Smelling like an all night ashtray

That a drunk has spewed in,

And hate.

I want to sit quietly

Avoid notice,

Alight when the time is right,

But part of me

Wants a ticket inspector

To set fire 

To the hate fuse,

The personal prison riot,

Bureaucracy and the beast,

Just to see what happens.

Fear kills empathy.

Parkstreet

Ko-fi

For Lisa, Christmas Eve

Hush! Hush!

Whisper who dares.

It’s Christmas Eve

In Queen Mary’s dollhouse.

Grandma wants 

The children to sleep.

To this end

She has pulled down the book

That nice Mr. Milne

Gave us last year,

But the children are having

None of it.

Their eyes are scrunched, 

But their legs are kicking

Beneath the blankets.

Because tomorrow Daddy will be home

All day,

And there’ll be food

And cake

And cake is a food,

But different,

Because when you’re full

You can’t eat more food,

But you can eat more cake

And nobody cares

That Christopher Robin

Is saying his prayers.

Grandma tries again

With a story of a little girl

On the other side of the world,

Where the sun is already up

And the girl

And her brother 

Are shooting each other

With brand new

Water pistols.

And she accidentally shoots her Daddy

To laugh at him dying

Like a B movie cowboy

On the floor

In front of the tree.

The children are snoring

Because Grandma’s stories

Are so very boring.

As she glides silently from the room

Grandma dares whisper,

“Do you like eggs children? Well suck those eggs.”

The children sleep the sleep of the innocent.

Hush! Hush!

Whisper who dares.

What’s that you say?

You’ve seen Queen Mary’s dollhouse 

And you didn’t see any children

In it?

Lisa did.

Parkstreet