Paper in the Wind Philip Scott Poli c2011
The ways we're not the same
Never seemed to matter much
We were young and insane
To think that love would be enough
And I was paper in the wind
I just blew from day to day
Should have seen that in the end
I'd just be blown away
Crying tears with someone else’s eyes
Never brave enough to feel or face my own pain
Reaching for stars in someone else’s skies
Everybody’s friend without my own game
You want something out of life
You make a plan and you see it through
You don't just sit around dreaming dreams
And wait for them to come true
But that's what I do
So if we go our ways
I'll take all the blame
It's my fault anyways
It's me that can't remain
Paper in the wind
I've got no time left to kill
If I don't choose my way soon
The wind will
Crying tears with someone else’s eyes
I suppose my own won’t kill me
But if I’m not for myself now, who will be?
Paper in the wind
I've got no time left to kill
If I don't choose my way now
The wind will
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Storms cPhilip Scott Poli 2010
Go ahead and punch holes in my walls
Make me wish I could fly away
But mine is not a fair weather heart so I stay
I stay on through your storms
Go ahead and run to your enablers
Go ahead it if you think you’re safer there
And then wish upon wish upon wish you could fly away
And we’ll both be like gulls we’ll fly in circles
In circles through your storms
But after a hurricane the flowers they grow back again
And the world oh the world is still beautiful
And the music in you, it’s my gift it’s true
And to tell you the truth, it’s all my dreams come true
So release it or claim it respect it or shame it
But your finger of blame it can’t wipe away all the ways I love you
And if the blood in your veins
Is all that remains between us
Why don’t you get a transfusion
Go ahead seal the illusion
But let there be no confusion
You can’t bleed away all the ways I love you
After a hurricane, the feelings they grow back again
And the world is still beautiful
The world is still beautiful
And you are still beautiful
String of Pearls cPhilip Scott Poli 2004
Just trying to beat the heat down here in auto town
Came across a Barracuda shining in blue
It was one of those childhood moments that just stays with you
Behind the wheel was a beautiful girl
I remember around her neck she wore a string of pearls
We said “our dad built that car right here in auto town” and she spoke
And the sweetness of her voice was like a magnet and made us gather round
But she said little boys you stay out of the plants
Run like hell now if the offer you the chance
To hit the line and build these beautiful machines
You could trade your lives for a living, go on now, chase your dreams
My first time through the gate my daddy cried
And I thought somehow I was stealing his pride
He said I hope they don’t keep you son and gave me a kiss
And in the blindness of youth I resented his wish
But now I’m fifty three and my thirty are in
And the boys all say go do and be all the things you should have been
But where would I go now and what would I do
It’s funny, you come in here just to get a little something but in the end
These places, they get you.
And Hiram’s mash is like a drunkards breath
It’s heavy on the night breeze
The sweet cicada’s song rattles down through the arms of the peach trees
This town is awash with all those should have beens and rather be’s
And the blues in the bars just agrees
Now when I look down that line I see that string of pearls
Each a treasure with a dream for their own little worlds
And I pray “life between these walls don’t pull them back beneath the sea”
Where the sun on the beach is just something else out of reach
And they become just like me.
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Coup De Grace
I had romantic visions of the Hobo life in the Boxcar Willy songs
Freight train loving freedom riders just rambling along
But the few I’ve met out here are not free, they’re like me
They’re running from some reason that’s hidden in a yesterday that’s gone
For me it was an illness that took my wife away
She was the treasure of a life that was a struggle every day
I was sick of the possessions and I was looking for escape
Her loss was the Coup de grace
And the languages I speak, and the positions that I held
The stocks I've owed and hats I've worn are hidden very well
Neath the whisky soaked whiskers and the worn out clothes
The graffiti on the bridges are my new Mona Lisa's
And water towers in one horse towns are my leaning towers of Pisa's
No concierge or maître' de
No one left to wait for, and no one to wait on me
Late one cool forgotten night I swear to god I saw
Her face in the sky over Arkansas
Or maybe it was ground fog up to some cruel joke
Or my imagination , or just some engine smoke
There is no romantic Hobo life from the Boxcar Willy songs
Just some shattered souls escaping roles from roads we once were on
Fumbling through our routines on Monday morning trains
Going nowhere, down to rags, as it slowly slipped away
Ready for the mercy, of the coup de grace
