The Sweetest Homewrecker

Peddling In Heartache

Better Off Alone (Green Valley Waltz)

when you were lost and lonely
and the maps were all wrong
and everywhere you tried to be
was where you did not belong
you stumbled onto something
that would ease your wounded mind
“come in, come in,” they said 
“you’re just in time”

(chorus)
for the rabbit hole
tumbling tunnel
of the rabbit hole
crouching spider's funnel
it’s an easy way in
good luck gettiin’ out again
from the rabbit hole

they spoke a secret language
you could somehow understand
they embraced you in the fold and then
they took you by the hand
and everything made sense
like it was meant to be
and you left your other life behind
your friends and family

(chorus)

mirror mirror on the wall
tell me what you think you see
is it fool’s gold or a
brilliant new reality
all the little voices 
laughing in you ear
they saw you coming, yes they did
and they’ll watch you disappear

(chorus)

old friends and intimates
they sit around the table
to reconstruct your memory
as best as they are able
whatever happened to
what’s her name
went down the rabbit hole
and never was the same

(chorus)

words and music © Jim Page
Whid-Isle Music, BMI
all rights reserved 

Rabbit Hole

living in a wounded world, pain is a fact of life
try to make sense, while you sit on the fence
but the fence is a knife 

lookin' through wounded eyes, always on alert
stranger lookin' at you but you don't look back
'cause somebody might get hurt

thinking with a wounded mind, strung to a puppeteer
you got it from your parents, who got it from theirs 
and it'll never disappear

traveling a wounded highway no way to get off
miles just fly past, but you're runnin' out of gas
and the engine starts to cough

see the hound of the Baskervilles, oh that great big beautiful dog
wrap it in chains, beat out its brains
let it loose in the fog

watch it kill go someone, the way they trained it to do
like the kid with the gun who runs to the drum
you would do it too

living in a wounded world, scars all over my heart
change in the weather, try to keep it together
but it just keeps fallin' apart

maybe one of these days but what do i know
tie your dream up tight the tail of a kite
and let the wind blow

Wounded World

in new york city where i was amazed
where i was stranded in my wandering days 

i met Preacher David who lived in the park
and where so did i also, when things got dark
 
he wore a football helmet all painted with words
and a cape of the same like the wings of a bird

a long handled cane and a bible also
like an old world prophet in a new world show

looking for something in that castaway place
where the streetlights reflected on his African face
 
something that was missing, for what did i ask
"to maybe find Jesus out here in the trash"

those were times of division between the day & the night
the rich and the poor, the black and the white

and the people who lived in tall buildings around
looked down the ones who lived on the ground 

so early one morning in the stark naked sun
into the park a police wagon come

to round up the bums, to take them to jail
for a night behind bars and a two dollar bail

so David the conjuror he leapt to his feet
and he ran to the wagon that was parked on the street

and he stood there so ferociously sane
with his bible, his helmet, his cape & his cane

"a curse on all of your money" says he
"your slums and guns and your misery

your courts and your jails and your crooked designs
that fall on the least of us most of the time"

and he moved to the beat of invisible drums
weaving his fingers and talking in tongues

and he lofted his cane like a spell caster's wand
as he circled the wagon and he tapped it upon

he walked around 3 times, he walked around 4
and he tapped on the windows the fenders and door

and he walked around 4 times, he walked around 5
like a crazy man kicking the bees in the hive

and the captain inside who was prepping the troops
who were watching crazy man walking the loops

then the door, yes the door, was opening wide
they took a deep breath and went outside

where david the exorcist sat back down
painting new words on a box that he'd found

while the cops from the wagon went bout their rounds
but didn't say hello and they didn't stick around

for maybe it was only the luck of the game
but everyone there would tell you the same

that they left empty handed, with no one in tow
got back in the wagon and away they did go

sometimes i think there's no way to explain
and that only the crazy are actually sane

and how the street theatrics, the shock & the awe
can puncture such holes in the web of the law

but i’ll always remember that day in the park
when the sun was so bright & his skin was so dark

the words on his helmet, his bible and cane
and the wagon that had to go back where it came 
	-- from

Preacher David

Blurry Face

Blurry Face (feat. John Medeski & Billy Martin)

Reversible Submersible

Reversible Submersible (feat. John Medeski, Billy Martin & Jason Fraticelli)

Mark Rubin interview w/ Jeff Spitzer-Resnick on WORT

“Memo About the Warrant” as performed on public radio's premier word game Says You!, recorded live in Chimacum, WA on Sunday, April 7, 2019 and later broadcast on NPR stations nationwide. Entire Says You! episodes are available by downloading free from iTunes, or you can download for pennies on their website. https://www.saysyou.net/listen-now/

To locate the episodes from Chimacum 2019,  search for these titles: SY 2313 and SY 2314. I appeared as musical guest with the support of Eric Bogart and Stringology, a local group which features Terianne Stratton on ukulele and Tracy Grisman on upright bass.

I’m grateful for the support from the other members of the band, as well as the rowdy live audience in the high school auditorium, and all the folks at Says You! Radio who laughed along with this word-play song in a classic country music format. 

The song was used as ‘filler’ while the word game contestants puzzled over their quandaries and stations across the country cut out to air local station id’s. The live audience responded well, and you can too since the archived episodes are all available in the Says You! archives. 

Download free from iTunes, or visit their website to download for pennies. ‘Memo About the Warrant’ appears at 36:40 during episode SY 2313, which first posted on May 9, 2019. https://www.saysyou.net/listen-now/

Many thanks also to Brad Friedman and Desi Doyen who first aired this song on the March, 28, 2018 Bradcast, a great syndicated program out of KPFK in Los Angeles. Ari Berman was the guest that day, and they finished by playing the song. Brad graciously offered to post text of the lyrics on his indispensable BradBlog. Right after the song first aired, they both laughed, and Desi exclaimed: “Wow, that was like Gilbert & Sullivan and Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie all rolled up into one!” 

Lyics: https://bradblog.com/Docs/MemoAboutTheWarrant_Lyrics_MattSircely020418.pdf

The following day, I placed the lyrics in a twitter thread, with separate tweets threading the song line-by-line. To this day, I keep thinking to myself: “What would Woody Guthrie do with twitter?” #WWWGDWT ? 

https://twitter.com/mattsircely/status/979460754364497920?s=20

Cover Image: Painting by Tracy Grisman - www.oldtimeyart.com

Memo About The Warrant - Live on Says You! Radio

Matt Sircely