You were a song I couldn't sing
caught like a bear by the bees with its hand in the hive
who complains of the pain of the sting
when I'm lucky I got out alive!
a life at best left half behind,
the taste of the honey still sweet on my tongue
and I'd run (Lord knows I've tried)
but there's no place on Earth I can hide
from the wrong I've done

then I saw a mountain and I saw a city
steadily sinking but suspiciously calm
it wasn't an end, it wasn't a beginning
but a ceaseless stumbling on
there, strapped like a watch on my wrist
that's finished with gold but can't tell the time
was all or what little pleasure exists
seductively sold and uselessly mine

our horse was fast and first from the gate
with the lead of a length at the sound of the gun
and the last of our cash laid down to fate (at 17 to 1)
but by the final stretch in the rear of the pack
that nag limping bad in the back
we reluctantly gave all the money we'd saved
1/5 to the commonwealth and the rest ot the track
then I saw a forest grow in the city
and a driftwood wall of birdhouse gourds
and I'm still waiting to meet a girl like my Mom
who's closer to my age
the true light of my eyes is a Pearl
equally emptied to equally shine
and all or what little joy in the world
seemed suddenly simple and endlessly mine

I was once the wine and you were the wineglass,
I was once alive when you held me,
but G-d became the glass,
all things left are emptiness
but oh, you're just a little girl
if you look out and see a trace
of a dark red that was once my face
in the clarity of such grace,
you'll forget all about me