March March is where i came in like a lamb but i want to go out like a lion if i can.  Put up a good fight and you could still put it right. Right for once, if you have hope! The spring rain fell and soaked my clothes completely and on the sidewalk all the worms came out to meet me. We were young and just starting school. April is the cruelest month if you have hope when you're in the family business cutthroat and reckless so deeply twisted they'll have you for breakfast! But grace is the ideal. To feel how the worms feel. There's no need to get real. You bet your life if you have hope. And still the same old syndicates prevail. We've got to send out all our lovebirds through the mail. You dream there might be a chance their May - December romance won't bite the dust if you have hope. But oh, it gets cold in Janu-weary. And i feel a hundred years old in Febru-dreary. The heart can't see its way to face another birthday but it does if you have hope when you're in the family business greedy and gutless so deeply twisted they hate what you love best! But grace is the ideal. To feel how the birds feel. There's no need to get real. You bet your life if you have hope. Well, you take a great risk. It's dangerous if you have hope. But there's no place like hope in the bleak midwinter. March is where i came in like a lamb but i want to go out like a lion if i can.   Twiddley-Dee Can't you see we're meant to be like the ghosts in the radio? Tesla's floating signals going places no one else will go 'cause they say they care but they don't mean it. They're only there when it convenient. Soon as asphalt turns to gravel they can't be found. But all i've tried to do is stick around and hold the rhythm down. Twiddley-dee! It's like money in the bank when you strike that chord and sound on sound the reels go 'round. They are Les Paul and Mary Ford! Then my hardest labour is a pleasure. A trip down a trail to a treasure. The featherweights flew when they found out it's all up hill. But all i've tried to do is keep the will when every jackpot's nil 'cause twiddley-dee-daw it gives me a thrill still.   Achilles At My Heels i am floating in a body that is slowly shifting shape and i'm tearing bits of skin off to let the fear escape and plucking all my nerve up 'cause chance favours the bold i strike out into the world but miss a step and knock myself out cold.  Stumbling down the road i hug my crutches tight like pylons around the site of an accident-prone soul keeps falling down a manhole to a reservoir of pain with Achilles at my heels again. Be still, my beating heart.  Well i know forewarned is forearmed but lately i'm all thumbs. i am marching with two left feet behind the fifes and drums. And holding up a brave face 'cause fate favours the strong i trip over a bootlace and i wonder what the hell went wrong.  Steady as she goes along. The bumps and bruises beam like firetrucks upon the scene of an accident-prone soul keeps slipping through a manhole to a reservoir of pain with Achilles at my heels. Be still, my bleeding heart.  Look at all the maple leaves tumbling from the tallest trees lining streets with some star-crossed ancient reminder of what was loved and what was lost.  Stumbling down the road i squeeze my crutches tight like pylons around the site of an accident-prone soul keeps crashing down a manhole to a reservoir of pain. Achilles at my heels. Be still, my breaking heart. Be still, my bursting heart.   Glenellen Drive-By On my bike with Dad behind me, holding on as i start riding. He lets go and i keep pedalling away from thirty-one Glenellen Drive. In my snowsuit, i begin to make a snowman, he turns into swimming pool and watermelon summer at thirty-one Glenellen Drive. Brother Rick, one floor below me, sings along to David Bowie. Brother Ron drives up in a custom, souped-up, rumbling, fire-red Mustang. Neighbourhood kids press their faces up to windows in the basement when his rock group called The Villains plays at thirty-one Glenellen Drive. Overcome on one holiday Mum breaks down and then walks away. Dad goes out and brings her in and no one mentions it again. A little poodle rolls in leaves. Grama sings Bringing In The Sheaves. The TV's on and pot roast's smelling good at thirty-one Glenellen Drive. On my swing and Mum is pushing. Raiding the raspberry bush when life is new and all is well. i'm safe at thirty-one Glenellen. Drive down Bunting. Turn on Gormley. Pass Dunraven and Hawthorne. See a glassed-in porch and blue Impala. You're at thirty-one Glenellen Drive. The bear is sleeping in his den. He's on the midnight shift again and Mum has got a bad migraine. Unless you want to start a riot keep the noise down and be quiet. Shhhh! On my bike with Dad behind me, holding on as i start riding. He lets go and I keep pedalling away from thirty-one Glenellen Drive.   Birds And Bees You're only human. You do what you can but what can you do but turn a kind eye and not a blind eye to our shared apocalyptic view?  So, is this how you know that you got soul by the way you feel the pain swallow it whole? Then let's go back to the things that we knew around the age of three when we were stronger when we belonged here with articles of faith like birds and bees flying in the sky where we could see them  and not parked inside some dark warplane museum. 'Cause all i've ever learned is i am at your service and 'cause you make a furnace of my heart i burn this way. You are a dream and i keep waking up in ashes. Oh, i need some help to forget myself when the scientist in me wants to make sense of this. So, do you suppose we could doff these clothes? Maybe we'll expose the secret of how it goes to be grateful and not hateful to be possessed and not haunted to be wanted to be loved out of paralysis and let the academics map desire. i only want to throw myself into this fire. 'Cause all i've ever learned is i am at your service and 'cause you make a furnace of my heart i burn this way. You are a dream a searing vision the brightest flame that my lucky eyes have ever seen but i keep waking up in ashes.   A Quiet Demon There's a quiet demon dug in at my side knocking the cat off the bed in the middle of the night messing up my apartment until i can get nothing done. Open up the cabinet there's a quiet demon. i go out searching for things as they once were but hovering about me is a quiet follower and like my mother would have said "you make a better door than a window" blocking out the sun you quiet demon. And a grievous sea pitches and pulls at my insides 'til it drowns the fishes and the little boats capsize and against all my wishes that old salt appears in tears holding on for dear life there's a quiet demon that just remains aloof boxing with my shadow and tearing shingles off my roof. What am i supposed to do? Should i fight or should i run? Open up a suitcase there's a quiet demon holding on for dear life.     Free Toronto Seeking out other possible worlds for a quite impossible girl - Mars or Neptune, Pluto looks nice. 'Cause i don't belong with this Earth-bound tribe. How can i possibly describe the mercury floating though my eyes? You've got to see for yourself. You've got to navigate. Oh, oh, oh. i hope it's not too late. You've got to fend for yourself and if you live oh, oh, oh. Something's got to give. They're painting themselves into a corner. Chinks are appearing in their armor down in Yorkville's trendy cafes. The occupation has engulfed Queen West. Kensington Market could be next. Will the displaced stumble with grace? You've got to see for yourself. You've got to navigate. Oh, oh, oh. This is your real estate. You've got to think for yourself and if you live oh, oh, oh. Something's got to give. In the Canuck corridors of power where they pump out the Celine Dee-yawn, yawn, yawn, it's enough to send you leaping off the CN Tower. They'll tell you "Be our guest", then say they heard she was depressed. "Depressed. Poor little thing. She was depressed". Seeking out other possible worlds for a quite impossible Girl, you've got to see for yourself. You've got to navigate. Oh, oh, oh. I hope it's not too late. You've got to fight for yourself and if you live oh, oh, oh. Something's got to give. Got to give, got to give up all delusions. Come to the obvious conclusions. Offer solutions. Bring peace north by northeast and free Toronto. Navigate. Liberate. This is your real estate. Round the artists up and hang them in the AGO. Oh, oh, oh…   Safekeeping Oh what an endless feast of sight, sound, taste, touch and smell that feeds a young heart. It's so tremendous that what mere kid can ever tell if he should be laughing or weeping buoyed or in despair so i put you away for safekeeping but i can't remember where. Dear heart. Behold the peace corpses undisturbed by the murky shape of things! There you rose up to counter the dark forces by the sweetness of your sufferings only but for my creeping doubt the fight was fair so i put you away for safekeeping but i can't remember where. Dear heart. Now you come back as rain or a flitter of a cardinal in the lane or the wee hours refrain of some far-off rumbling train. Dear heart. Oh you little dandy never think that i don't miss you just because i've had a drink too many and a skin too few that once the whole world could see you leaping and in such desperate need of care so i put you away for safekeeping but i can't remember where.   Intelligent Life Sure as a honeybee's touch is key to a bud's survival a squirrel's rush for nuts is ushered in by fall's arrival as a butterfly's migration claims another generation who die along the journey so their offspring can thrive, oh for better or for worse, sooner or later we all find out we're moved by something greater. My brain keeps stock like a scorecard of my spoils of greed and lust. My heart belongs to a scrapyard. It just wants to lay low and rust! Well it's always ashes to ashes in the end. Nothing but dust to dust. Oh, but what if the stars are wishing on us?  i want to come through come through to total light light under transparent skin like a firefly in the night or a glow-worm inching across some impossible traverse. Be living proof that you can find love or at least a little sign of intelligent life in the universe. Been tearful and fearful and angry and tired of lying, denying the thing most desired lest the great quest may be met with derision assuming some human will suffer a listen! But a breakthrough can wake you at four in the morning to shout that your rhetoric has become boring! Been winking and blinking and nodding off dimly all half-assed through a dark glass grimly! Yes, i know you you want to come through come through to total light light under transparent skin like a firefly in the night or a glow-worm inching across some impossible traverse. Be living proof that you can find love or at least a little sign of intelligent life in the universe! Funny little eye peeping in the sky. Funny little voice bidding in the noise. Funny little soul waving in the hole. Funny little heart mooning in the darkness.   Missing Man A little crowd gathers on the ground for a solemn observation and the planes fly overhead in a missing man formation. A missing man formation for a missing man of action with the missing information in a mission of destruction.  i was cold so i bought gloves at an army surplus store but i know there's no way i'm ever going to win this war in someone else's clothes, serving someone else's aims with someone else's hands pulling all the strings.  Oh, dutiful ghost of the past who takes the amnesia to task is victory lost to you now or can you still win out somehow?  Dark dove of peace. Flight of the damned. All the world's flags wave to you at half-mast. Still awaiting permission to land. Hauling such fragile cargo as you fly past. Missing man. Missing man.  Can we still hope to build a new humanity that's just, where you die to what you love instead of dying if needs must? Dying if needs must on the beaches at Dieppe or the nightmare in Iraq - have we had enough of that yet?  Oh, beautiful ghost of the past who takes the amnesia to task is victory lost to you now or will the truth still out somehow?  Mark of the beast. Blood of the lamb. All the world's flags wave to you at half-mast. Still awaiting permission to land. Hauling such precious cargo as you fly past. Missing man. Missing man. Missing woman. Missing man.  When your unknown soldier comes home stand firm below. Open your soul and let him land. Missing man.   Swan Song In the salon de refuse the people point and laugh and spew their glib reactions to all the mad abstractions. The world is theirs, we just live downstairs in the basement with the draft. The roommate from St. Catharines swirls out with the bath. Baby, it's always going to be that way. When are you going to embrace your painful beauty that doesn't want to show its face out in the daylight, hunting you at night? See the tongue-tied, doe-eyed darlings of the dark side swinging deals behind the scenes with two fists. Truth is, what's come home to roost? Just humanoid bank machines. Still there must be a place for us little burnt-out sunbeams. Baby, it's always going to be that way. When are you going to embrace your painful beauty that doesn't want to show. What have they done to you? Weren't they the same ones who once booed Bob Dylan too? What a shame so much affection is wasted on perfection. Blown on a swan that anyone can see the glory of. But objects in the mirror are grosser than they appear. Admire them. Desire them. But only a mother could love such an ugly baby. It's always going to be that way. When are you going to embrace your painful beauty that doesn't want to show. What have they done to you? Aren't they the same ones who once booed Bob Dylan too?