LYRICS FROM
SHORTS
2013
All Songs P & ©, various years, by Zanindemand Music ASCAP
* Unless otherwise noted
ONE STEP LEFT
One step left - fell to the knee
Need a smoke - and a place to breathe
So unsure - never before
Write this note - slip it under your door
Tell me which way we’re going?
It would be nice to know
Will it be good for you? - I don’t know
Well I hope so
Strange this time - so confused
See my face - lookin’ deep into you
Do not talk - who knows who to trust?
Hide your dreams - someone might crush 'em to dust
Open any door
Blow on dem bones and watch ‘em roll on the floor
Is that the number you were looking for?
Holding fast - ear to the ground
Pray for signs - don that thorn and crown
Love is love - good or bad
You're dead without - So give it all that you have
Written by Zan Burnham, Philip Dessinger, Tom Textor © 2013
ICE DAY
Ice day - I can’t remember when I’ve felt the sun shinedown on me
Ice day - I can't remember where I lost my way, lost what I used to be
I am like a winter tree
You can see through me
I’m like a rock in frozen ground
Like a ship on an ice-bound sea
A summer breeze - moonlight on a lake - a midnight kiss
A thousand smiles - a million miles - beautiful dreams
In ecstasy who would ever dream of this
The price you pay is so much more - more than it seems
I'm holding on I don't know how
I know I don't know why
I took a leap before I looked
And I don't want to die
Ice day - I can’t remember when I’ve felt the sun shinedown on me
Ice day - I can’t remember why I even woke
BAD TIMING
I wish I first saw your face
In a different time and place
Where it didn’t have to hurt to feel
And what you dare to dream is real
I guess I missed again
It was bad bad bad bad timing - we didn’t have a chance
Bad bad bad bad timing - such a short romance
Bad bad bad bad timing - and it hurts (so bad)
I won’t forget your kiss
Your touch I’m always gonna miss
But somebody had to say
In love we just could not stay
Why did things turn out that way?
It was bad bad bad bad timing - we didn’t have a chance
Bad bad bad bad timing - such a short romance
Bad bad bad bad timing - and it hurts (so bad)
Look me up in a couple of years
By then I think I could risk more tears
You never know it might work out
It’s something to think about
'Cause only the timing was off - oh such
Bad bad bad bad timing - we didn’t have a chance
Bad bad bad bad timing - such a short - such a sweet romance
Bad bad bad bad timing - and it hurts - so bad
THE DAYS OF OUR LIVES
I met a man sweet man he lived in strife, had a frustrated wife
Kinda wasted his life
He said “Son I tried to follow my dreams"
But I got lost - it seems
“I'll never know what it all really means...”
He said “I stood up for what I did believe“
And I always figured lady luck was up my sleeve
“I laughed at fear, I was strong and stout“
And now I sit inside, I don’t come out”
I met a girl sweet girl she wanted to be a queen
Live in some kinda royalty scene
Her own grass was never green
She always said “Everything, everything - it’ll all work out”
She didn’t have a clue or a doubt
And now she’s got the gout
But she remembers when times weren't so bad
When the future held the promises it had
“Back then I was happy” she says with half a smile
“I only wish it had lasted a little while"
These are the days sweet days the days of our lives
Don’t get many if you get any
I met a boy sweet boy he sang a good tune,
Howled at the moon
He rode around in a red balloon
Said "All you need is love, give peace a chance somehow
"Chase away those sacred cows, and don’t kowtow to the big bow wows!"
But then he went and he prematurely died
Some crazy sucker shot him right between the eyes
His friends all cried he had so much to live for
I guess you never know what’s behind the next door
These are the days sweet days the days ofour lives
Don’t get many if you get any
I met a man sweet black man from Richmond, C.S.A.
He was a hundred years if he was a day and all those years as a slave
Then one day black soldiers came to his town
He fell to his knees, he fell to the ground - and he said “I hear trumpets sound!
“Well I have waited all my life for this, and nobody’s betrayin’ nothin’ with no kiss!
“Now I can die me a happy man, but please don’t ask me why I don’t understand”
I heard a song sweet song on my radioTook me places I did not know
Watchin’ the river flow
And I have met some kindred spirits here
We share the laughter we share the fear
We break bread and share a beer
And there are things you can’t always explain
So much sufferin’ so much pain
Can’t call it paradise all of the time
But if you learn to live with it
Life can be so fine
These are the days sweet days the days of our lives
You don’t get many if you get any
ONLY THE EARTH ENDURES
A feather lies upon the ground
Down under centuries of dust
It once gleamed golden colors
But long ago all the gold turned to rust
On this land lived good people
Who’d found a place under the sun
But then there came invaders
With their greed and their lies and their guns
It didn’t have to be that way
They both could have shared the land some way
But the invaders wanted (they took) everything
Now it's all legends, dioramas - a song they'd sing
“The old ones say
Only the earth endures
You spoke trulyYou are right”
Isolated in Eden
With no resistance to disease
And those lucky to live through it
They were driven to their wounded knees
And descendants of survivors
In an irony of time
Share addictions with their masters
As they all head for the end of the line
Wi-ca-hca-la kin he yaPe lo ma-ka kin le-ca la
Te han yun-ke-lo, e-ha pe-loe-hanj-ke-con wi-ca ya-ka pe-lo
I'M ON MY WAY
It was one of those very good times
Good music good wine
When, in spite of it all, somebody said -
"What're we gettin' - just a night of forgettin'
That someday we'll all be dead"
A shout-out from the Grim Reaper, a reminder we all know
"Ev'rybody ev'rywhere someday you got to go!"
That's news to no one Mr. Reaper, that information is not so rare
And I feel like livin' right now like I don't care!
I mean whaddaya want me to say
I know! I'm on my way
Do I look worried?
Ev'rybody dreams about fame and fortune, livin' the good life, and
havin' it all
You can audition for the part but never get the call
Some people go for material objects, some people call it all a joke
But who wouldn't gladly be the opposite of broke?
I mean whaddaya want me to say
I know! I'm on my way
Just show me the money!
It's so easy to forget in this life we lead
That ev'rything -ev'rything is such a miracle indeed
But who always sees? Who really knows?
So just try to remember
At least a little wherever you go
Now the next time I go to a party, I'm gonna get that Ol' Reaper to go
'Cause there's so many things that man he just do not know
Like it's wonderful to be here, like we've really got it made
You can follow the sun - oh! - you can follow the shade!
I mean whaddaya want me to say
Now be cool Reaper...
I know! I'm on my way
I'm just not in a rush...
I'm on my way, yeah, yeah
Good God I'm on my way
I COLOR ME BLUE
The green leaves are changing
Another summer is gone
The school bell rings, the robin flies
I see a lot of red, yellow & orange
So many colors, so many hues
But mostly - I color me blue
The world casually takes me to some good places - oh yes it does
But all of these places and faces and traces
Slip away - and it brings me down
I have a part-time lover and old friends
I see all too rarely
It seems these days no one can spare much time - mmmmm dollars & dimes
And so many of the stranger’s faces that I just happen to see
Seem sad and lonely too
With these inspirations - I color me blue
The music plays on the guitar only songs of sadness
The music cries in my soul for the sound of joy
I’ve gotta get out of hereI’ll go anywhere I don’t care where
What do I have here?
What can I be just over there?
And I‘ll throw off all of these chains
I'll take control of the reins
I’ll get away - I’ll be free
The light’s growing dimmer
It’s gettin’ too dark to see all those day dreams
So I guess I’ll pack it in for the night - ooh long lonely night
Trudging along down this twilight avenue
And in the shades left to see - I color me blue
LEARNING HOW TO LOVE
I lost fourteen thousand dollars and let some expectations down
Conscripted party to some sleight-of-hand on the edge of Chinatown
And in a movie Mickey Rourke says “You can fight a thousand years of history...”
But why people steal and kill, do terrible things, ultimately, it’s another mystery
What a way to celebrate my birthday, sometimes it seems it’s hard to survive
Then something made me count up all the time I’ve round up, the days I’ve been alive
And wouldn’t you know I counted about fourteen thousand days I have lived,
And I counted another brother I’ve got to find fourteen thousand ways to forgive
In ev'ry moment, each of us can create
Beauty or pain & hate
Lest we forget, it’s all about
Learning how to love
I had one of those summers where every day was so vital and alive
Hot town, summer in the city, down to the shore and goin’ up the country, and a bit of that old hand jive
But then at the end, the unexpected again, I offended a friend and we parted
Somewhere on the side of the road
A couple of castaways, victims in this life of letting go - letting go
I rode my bicycle down by the Hudson River - like a Hudson River painting where
I had a casual encounter, a conversation with a couple of Canadian geese who were there
In tune, in tune
What do you hold on to?
What can you hold on to?
In ev'ry moment, each of us can create
Beauty or pain & hate
Lest we forget, it’s all about
Learning how to love
And then one day I looked into my baby’s eyes, I saw a baby there
A beautiful beautiful beautiful beautiful boy
And time goes on spinnin’ by - the rivers ebb the rivers rise, last night I said to the wife
It’s a little rough but we’re holdin’ on, hold on to me, hold on to life - hold on hold on
In ev'ry moment, each of us can create
Beauty or pain & hate
Lest we forget, it’s all about Learning how to love
I had a great day just the other day and a bad day the day after it
These things come in cycles, the positive and negative of all of it
FLY AWAY
I can still remember the sound of the jet airplanes
Coming into Westchester and then leaving town again
And Mark and I would watch them come in and out of sight
And we’d talk about the future as the planes took flight
And we’d dream we would fly
We would fly away
Now both of us loved music, and Mark, he was into funky stuff
We sent a million dreams on the wings of those planes
But we never thought it would be so so tough gettin’ one off the ground
‘Cause when you’re young and still unbroken, nothin’ holds you down
And we’d dream we would fly
We would fly away
Been more than twenty years since I’ve seen him - who knows when we were last in touch
You know no one wants to talk about things that ain’t amounted to much
But I'll bet he's still dreamin' and sendin' dreams up in the air
Headed for horizons, that just ain’t always there
Still we dream we can fly
We can fly away
We can fly
We can fly away
There’s strength in their landing’s and majesty as the airplanes go
Yes I still go down to the airport when I'm feeling lost and low
When I need to believe there’s ways to be free
Like you could just get on an airplane
And be where you want to be
Someday I know I will fly
I will fly away
We can fly - We can fly away
We can fly - We can fly away