How Long (#JamuarySongADay 2022 No. 6)

Sunflower seeds in foreign soldiers’ pockets
Pictures of loved ones in wallets and lockets
Uniforms move forward under flying rockets
But only come back, come back as skeletons 

Dreams of the way it was a day before evaporate
Tears of regret fall salty, wet faces at a faster rate
The opposite of love is indifference we learn too late
It can only come back, come back as skeletons

Flesh is all too fallible and far too prone to fear
Blood is spiked with passion and spilled even easier 
Wars will take them both to rot in majesty austere 
Nothing to come back, come back but skeletons

Skeletons (#FAWM 2022 No. 24)

Love (T.K.O.)

Being Boring

Maybe it was the leaves, maybe it was the wind
Maybe just a false alarm, coming from underneath my skin
I looked at the blinds from where I lay in bed,
tried to calm the shuddering in my hands and my head
It's only the security lights
They're supposed to make me feel alright
Reassure me of the deal so long as I can feel

Reassure me that there's no one outside
planning to do me harm or damage,
reassure me somehow that I can manage:
I remember that old adage

There's nothing to provide a fright
so long as I can see security lights

Security Lights (#FiftyNinety 2022 No. 13)

I want you broad across my shoulder,
enough to bear me when I'm a complainer
I want you angling a grin at the shape I'm in, 
drunk off my wine but not off my container

You may want me but you don't have to
If you don't want me, know you always can
just be the wave who knows it's not the water: 
here for the moment, neither man nor plan

I want you telling me heaven is a farm
whenever some sower casts us in the sewer 
I want you fluent in multiple tongues, still
skilled enough to choose one or fewer

I Want You (#FiftyNinety 2022 No. 15)

Undo Redo - The Longest Time (Billy Joel cover)

Before the blackness 
rises up to swallow my soul
I'll tell you my story so 
you know it true and whole
Who you share it with 
after that is not my concern
all I ask is light a match, 
make sure my remains burn

One favor I ask of you
Tell no one that I've died
only say to my last day 
I closed my eyes 
unsatisfied

I opened my mouth let out 
a shout in a town not far from here
Even when I stood still I made sure 
my mind was in uppermost gear
No woman or man since's been 
able to keep me still or shut me up
except when I bother to sleep or 
I'm over a plate or deep in some cup

I blinked and I was walking, I blinked 
and I started pointing and talking
Flashing lights, needles in the red, 
everything exciting, nothing shocking
No discipline or cause's been able 
to keep me still or shut me up
except when I bother to sleep or 
I'm over a plate or deep in some cup

Unsatisfied (#FiftyNinety 2022 No. 49)

verse
If it was all an act, we were actor and actress
taking tiny toy guns out for target practice
blanks in the chamber go boom when finally fired
If it was all a scene, these costumes convinced
now they're in wardrobe, ain't been seen since
oh, beg me not to blame you for the way you're wired

chorus
If I'm missing you,
it's not because my aim is low 
If I'm missing you, 
it's because I'm letting us go
You're dead to me, but I'm not haunted
just so you know this ain't a goodbye kiss
so much as one of us might've wanted 
with me it'll never be hit or miss

verse
If it was all a role, well, bless your heart and soul
quiet on the set, cue every line you remembered to forget
high-caliber punch-ups delivered as part of the plot
don't mind me darling I'll be sitting over there
with my name on the back of my chair
glass in my hand raised in the air for the martini shot

chorus
If I'm missing you,
it's not because my aim is high 
If I'm missing you
it's only because I'm saying goodbye
You're only dead to me, I'm not haunted
just so you know this ain't a goodbye kiss
so much as one of us might've wanted 
with me it'll never be hit or miss

bridge
Every time you tried to land a heavy hand on me
those pads and cushions helped with the pushing
They built in the distance now widening between
no more soothing or hushing your panting and rushing
Seeing you is my last hope at the other end of my scope
You got caught slippin', now you're fading out of frame
what a shame

Hit Or Miss

You asked me if I wanted to come over. In the gap before answering, I thought, here’s the thing: I could look for parking, wonder "is it something I ought to be sparking?"

I could spin the block, revel in the knowledge that it’s never going to look the same the next time I go round, I let out a sound, I open my eyes and look down at you.

That’s when I realized I never answer

I guess I come off uncouth. I’ve never been all that smooth.
You trust me awkward. You wouldn’t have me any other way.

Awkward (#SAWC 2025 No. 1)

And we walk along the street 
whistling a tune, passing the sign 
that says “coming soon”

Nobody works down here anymore
not when they don’t have to show up
nothing but empty windows and locked doors
every bar counter has unraised cups

It’s not so much a future forestalled
so much as a present outcome uncalled,
something not easily dialed and even
if we could, what would be its style?

What we don’t find online, 
what we don’t have delivered
we can forget we ever needed it

The convenience of others, 
the rubbing of shoulders, 
the serving of duty and presence

Empty blocks and sidewalks and venues
the city dreams of other uses beyond 
scenery, the missing us, the vacant we

Coming soon (#SAWC 2025 No. 8)

I wear my father's name and his mercury boots
they lean me lucky, carry me forward through time
All I have to do in order to move from his roots
is close my eyes, lean backwards, into the past I climb

I heard my mother's name, I was in the airport lounge
Feels like she got her wings years ago, I heard her say
Spitting image of a girl chasing planes into the distance
As it turned out, she didn't even spell it that way

My brother out in Vegas, it's like the desert air preserves him
My sister out on the coast on one side of suburban grass
Other brother further south, been so long since I've seen him
Other sister on the other side of that grass was a sweet lass

Mercury boots (#SAWC 2025 No. 11)

Am I having a conversation with a human being
‘Cause I’m having trouble capturing your meaning
Are the words you type just type or just my type
Were you deepfaking our deepfaking the other night

So we’re way past hot or not
Tell me tell me baby, are you bot or not
Can you connect the dot to dot
I gotta gotta know if I just got got

I thought our connection was more than secure
With proper protections so that we could endure
You told me not even the future was futureproof
Now I’m starting to wonder if that was ever the truth

A flimsy flash in the pan
A hollowed out hologram
Zero to one and back to zero
Forever and ever followed by finito

They say to err is human
They say to forgive is divine
But digital doubt is looming
Can anyone still be true online
Can anything still be true online

So we’re way past hot or not
Tell me tell me baby, are you bot or not
Can you connect the dot to dot
I gotta gotta know if I just got got

Bot or not (#SAWC 2025 No. 12)

Ayer fue malo, hoy no pinta bien, pero podría salir de cualquier manera, mañana solo puede ser mejor. No me molesta Evil Inc., pero ¿tiene tan mal gusto para la moda? Siempre estoy demasiado ocupada para violar la ley, soy demasiado guapa para tener defectos.

Yesterday was bad, today doesn't look great but it could go either way, tomorrow can only be better. I don't mind Evil Inc., but must it have such bad fashion sense? I'm always too busy to break the law, I'm too pretty to have any flaws.

Ayer y hoy (#SAWC 2025 No. 13)

I’ve never seen 
you wear a watch
Or look up at the sun 
or the moon in the sky
and now I’m starting 
to wonder why
I’ve never seen you 
pay attention to the calendar
You treat the days just like a blur

The only way I’ve ever seen 
you observe the passage 
of time is to say something 
hasn’t happened yet. 
You operate with the kind 
of remove that makes 
me want to prove you’re 
only laying down a bet. 

Everything simply hasn’t 
happened so far, so far. 
Everything hasn’t 
happened yet, so far, so far.

Are the rest of us petty mortals
trapped in the flow, always on the go
until circumstances intervene
and force us mere players off-screen
or out of the scene?

So far (#SAWC 2025 No. 14)

The cost of living (#SAWC 2025 No. 15)

Making way for the unexpected
Open eyes and a beating heart
Legs that work and arms to hold in
everything that keeps me from falling apart

I’m all right, going day and night through
my chores, opening windows, closing doors
making choices, pondering my voices
my options under new terms and conditions

Making way for the unexpected
Open eyes and a beating heart
Legs that work and arms to hold in
everything that keeps me from falling apart

I’m in a room with a bunch 
of people who are younger 
they’re not asking me for advice, 
all I can see in their eyes is hunger
and on their tongues 
is the shape of a world that’s young, 
newly born if they can make it

And all I want to tell them is 
things used to be lower, slower, 
a grower, so if they get a chance
consider romance, not just love 
but a better kind of story

All I have is gratitude 
for everything that made me what I am
All I have is gratitude
I should be unhappy maybe but it feels 
like that would be rude
All I have is gratitude
for everything that made me what I am

Making way for the unexpected
Open eyes and a beating heart
Legs that work and arms to hold in
everything that keeps me from falling apart

Falling apart (#SAWC 2025 No. 16)

There's a tattoo of a river on your shoulder
There's a mind that'd like to know what it means
There's hands wondering if the water's warmer or colder
Is it Thames in London or Mississippi in New Orleans

There's a tattoo of a river on your shoulder
There's a half chance you'll tell me when I'm older

One flows down from the north into gulfwater mists
One flows east from the west toward Southend-on-sea
One flows from your neck along your arm to your wrist
And it shimmers like a silver charm calling out to me

In the right light, your skin glows gently like silver
River banks look as lit as city street grids at night
But then I blink my eyes just to catch the afterimage
Reversed for an instant so you glimmer in my sight

River on your shoulder

Normalization Blues

Goofing around with a fellow Oakland Soft Rock Choir member before practice, I heard her say she was planning to learn how to play this, and I got curious about how I might sound playing it

Huey Lewis and The News - The Power Of Love

Pet Shop Boys, West End Girls

The Moments, Love On A Two Way Street

So much confusion
When autumn comes around
What to do about October
How to smile behind a frown?
It's hard to settle down

It's so bemusing
Will they cancel the parade?
We marched each October
Now they say we were never even saved
We must be very brave

Shall I rewrite or revise
My October symphony?
Or as an indication
Change the dedication
From revolution to revelation?

So we're all drinking
As leaves fall to the ground
Because we've been thinking
How October's let us down
Then and now

Shall we remember
December instead?
Or worry about February?
Mourn our war-torn dead
Never seeing red?

Shall I rewrite or revise
My October symphony?
Or as an indication
Change the dedication
From revolution to revelation?

Pet Shop Boys, My October Symphony

Love Is Like An Itching In My Heart

Reporter, blogger, musician, fan. Tinman, Taylor Swift, Soulja Boy, spyboy.

allaboutgeorge

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