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Loss and Found

Compass      I Never Lose      Sundown   Maybe      The Moon is Ours     
Cocktail Hour     Full Disaster      Not Much       Plane
Compass

Can you feel it 

as you fail to fall asleep, 

The fluttering near your ears 

whispers "fait accompli"

 

Do you notice how your thirst

will not let you be?

The desert is parted 

only by drinking from me

 

I’m circling you 

in the blanched afternoons

The only direction is me

Surrender, honey

I'm all that is left

Thundering hooves trample

only the deaf

 

The sand in your hand

sifts into drifts of my name

It's getting closer

the stake of my claim

 

I will roll your thoughts

and smoke them to ashes

Your best seduction

just sputters and thrashes

 

I’m circling you 

in the blanched afternoons

The only direction is me

Surrender, honey

I'm all that is left

Thundering hooves trample

only the deaf.

Maybe

Could be close ---  Could be near

From out of nowhere...   Nowhere is here.

One misstep, one false move...

But there's nothing and no one

I've got to pursue 

so why do I let Nothing chase me?

 

Maybe     everything is ok

It's almost possible      everything is ok

Is it allowed, this beautiful day?

Maybe....

 

If I burn then I'm pure

I turn threat to allure

Vigilance   at high speed

Oh the Past loves the Past

and I'm running so fast, if I stopped 

would it still be behind me?

 

Maybe     everything is ok

It's almost possible      everything is ok

Is it allowed, this beautiful day?

Maybe....

 

What makes you feel this way?

This crazy will run you right down.

I can't make a move without

thorough approval from ghosts 

who have nothing to say.

 

Batter my heart, three-person'd God,

for you As yet but knock, breathe, shine,

and seek to mend;

That I may rise and stand, o'erthrow me, and bend Your force to break, blow, burn,

and make me new.

I, like an usurp'd town to another due,

Labor to admit you, but oh, to no end;

Reason, your viceroy in me,

me should defend,

But is captiv'd, and proves weak or untrue.

Yet dearly I love you, and would be lov'd fain, 

But am betroth'd unto your enemy;

Divorce me, untie or break that knot again,

Take me to you, imprison me, for I,

Except you enthrall me,

never shall be free,

Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.

- John Donne c.1609

 

Maybe     everything is ok

It's almost possible      everything is ok

Is it allowed, this beautiful day?

Maybe….

I Never Lose

car keys, track of time

innocence, my place in line

self-control, a glove, a sock

luggage, or my train of thought

 

Not me

 

patience, the extra weight

sunglasses, the war, the faith

all respect, my phone, the fight

my head, my way, my appetite

 

Not me, I never lose

Not me, I never lose

 

If beggars can't be choosers

winners can't be losers

So how could you slip away?

 

I'm looking for a lost and found

suddenly I'm losing ground -- 

It's not supposed to be this way
 

the will to live,

some way to cope

how I dream, if I hope

a way to breath, an alibi

everything, all I desire

 

Not me, I never lose

Not me, I never lose

There's just one thing

just one thing

Where are you?

The Moon is Ours

What shall we do today?

The rain on the mangoes

seems to say,

"You can forget the heat

Stay in these tangled sheets"

 

Tomorrow will make its way

whether or not we go or stay

Nighttime melts into day

Daylight just floats away

We share the stars

The moon is ours  completely

We share the stars

The moon is ours to hold onto

 

Swim in a deep blue dream

I follow you You follow me

A room and a bed and a breeze

Eat from the mango trees

 

We share the stars

The moon is ours  completely

We share the stars

The moon is ours

 

We share the stars

The moon is ours  completely

We share the stars

The moon is ours to hold onto

Full Disaster

raving the streets

Raskolnikov numb

laying in cuts to survive 

flailing the sweetest hope

being dumb will keep you alive

 

I’m in full disaster 

I’m in full disaster 

What would you say comes after?

Full Disaster

 

fire and logic

are weaving me chains 

do you belong? all wrong

clutching at iron and rain 

giving up then going on

 

I’m in full disaster 

I’m in full disaster 

What would you say comes after?

Full Disaster

 

she tried, I tried

 

suffocating,

and plans for escape 

finding dead birds on the porch 

self-portraits drawn

with the lens cap on 

refusal is taken by force

 

I’m in full disaster 

I’m in full disaster 

What would you say comes after?

Full Disaster

Not Much

I gave you more than what I owed

Girls capture rapture in thin air

When I gave up      

called your bluff,

there was no one there.

 

It seems we both agreed to believe

you were the man you ought to be

When I stepped back

let go the slack,

I learned what hollow means.

 

It wouldn't take much

It would not have taken much

For you to not break my heart

 

It wouldn't take much

It would not have taken much

For you to not break my heart

 

Viewing you

as though you'd come through

And in my blind-eyed years,

you limped along          

'til things went wrong,

then you disappeared.

 

It wouldn't take much

It would not have taken much

For you to not break my heart

 

It wouldn't take much

It would not have taken much

For you to not break my heart

Sundown

Here are my lipstick

and colored clothes

Here are my dancing

and painted toes.

You tell me what

You tell me how

I'm too tired

for now

 

Here is the winding,

the second hand

Here are the lists

of all I'd planned.

You tell me what

You tell me how

I'm too tired

for now

A bird stole my voice

A death took my choice

The sky is empty now.

The sun goes where it will

I can not keep it still

down and

down and

down
 

Here is a memory

I thought would stay,

The hole in the center

of every damn day

You tell me what

You tell me how

Cocktail Hour

I like to be in the cocktail time 

With the cocktail rhythm

and the cocktail rhyme

Pour me a gin,

squeeze me a lime

Add a tonic,

unironic

'cause it's so damn fine

 

Let me introduce

a vermouthy Houdini

Call him Mr. Olive

in a dry martini

Call me Duchess Satin, 

Duke and me

are speakin' Latin

I take three cherries

in my rye Manhattan

 

Cocktail Hour sip from a glass

Hoping that Brubeck

will make it all last

Cocktail Hour slips away fast

Hoping that Jobim

will make it all last

 

Potent potable arena,

cocktail waitress -

have ya seen her?

I'm a caipirinha ballerina

servin' you a soul subpoena

Despair repair

earnin' me a Croix de Guerre

Conversation elevatin'

bringin' in the debonair

 

Absinthe bushwhack

tracking back a Sazerac

Napoleon Cognac

warmin' up the Cossacks

Shake a White Lady, 

provoke a 180

Keeping swell? I tell you well  

I'm self-regulating   

 

Cocktail Hour sip from a glass

Hoping that Brubeck

will make it all last

Cocktail Hour slips away fast

Hoping that Jobim

will make it all last

Plane

I get it

I get it 

I just don't understand

how a plane stays up in the air

I know it

I learned it

I just can't understand

how it is that you're no longer here.

 

The world

was not meant to hold this shape,

with a hole gouged out of its side.

An unexplainable loss     

I can't see across

the invisible length of your life

 

I try to remember

and all I can see

are some outlines and colors

 I cannot perceive.

Your laugh falls away,

your urgencies fade

goddamn it I need you to stay

 

I get it

I get it 

I just don't understand

how a plane stays up in the air

I know it

I learned it

I just can't understand

how it is that you're no longer here.

 

This is not right,

that's all I can tell you

The day and the night all agree.

So the world moves along

Its movement is wrong

You shouldn't be here in my song

All lyrics written by Catherine Warner, Catherine Warner Music (ASCAP)

© Catherine Warner Music. All rights reserved.

Compass
I Never Lose
Sundown
Maybe
The Moon is Ours
Cocktail Hour
Full Disater
No Much
Plane

© 2020 Catherine Warner Design

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