Southern United States
I had a dream I was standing beneath the Memphis moon
with William Blake painting and Crosby crooning
and his father was a sailor
Who left his mother young, and so she dressed him the same
He took after his father, without the last name
A Welshman from Tennessee
Who spoke with an accent that resembled no other
Cut from the cloth, he showed me his daughter
And Lilly was a Rose
Married into money but it only changed her clothes
with her eyes hair closed and her hands arisen
she leaned into talk and leaned in to listen
She said those political songs they’re worth missing

I awoke at the wheel
With the wind, road and radio fluttering in my ears
I was following my heart like I hadn’t for years
I put on Lou Reed’s Berlin
I had a friend once that asked me..”Who needs Berlin?”
“well”, I said, “I guess it depends on the state that you’re in.”
I was stopped at the border
I don’t know what they thought I had but by the end, I’d had it
Low Texas drawl coming over the static
I looked up at the bristling stars and they looked so sad it was the Southern United States

Old gas station hasn’t changed in decades
Cashier checks the time around her
put my things on the counter
Pull out my wallet like some pull down the shades
My only brother lent me his only car
who knew I would drive it so far

Sometimes you move out of some obligations
It was gorgeous on the outside, inside it was just a machine
it was the fastest thing I’ve ever seen
I first met Victoria at Victoria station
We’d always talked about going for a beer
She said, “It’s strange now that you’re here.”

We went back to her place, 57th we’d cross it
She’s as poor as me but she looks twice as good
I told her that because it’s something I would
She shrugged a little and she turned off the fauset
And later on as we were crawling into bed
I was thinking on something my father had said

He said, “You’re better off, off of the main drag.”
with my well-worn body wrenched like a rag
There I was, straight off the main drag

I should have never lent you that 45, I guess my lesson is not to lend
There’s a big needle over the line and for a time you have a friend
But stone cold silence in the room means the record is at its end
You’re turning it over so many times
It’s never going back into its sleeve again
There’s two; sides to every story but it seems like you’ve got ten
When I get no letters, it’s the Cairo blues you send

Cairo, Cairo
Cairo is my baby’s home
Women in Cairo, Cairo
Sure don’t dance alone

Every time you get lonesome you go and fill yourself to the brink
Find yourself a man in a suit and tie who’ll introduce you to what he drinks
He’s answering your questions funny now so you’ll wonder how he thinks
He sees his reflection in you skin, you’re gonna see yours in the hotel sinks
Staring back, the Cairo blues it never blinks

Thin winter trees looking like railings for the sky
I got my bare hands in my coat pockets, it’s so cold I could cry
When I see that forest falling, all I hear is firewood
Crackling louder than that record ever could
But it don’t drown out those Cairo blues for good

Photographer friend, photographer friend
I’ll see you in the end
You ain’t like y other friends, you never judge
Picture’s worth a thousand words, it explains why we don’t talk
As we travel past the perfumed rows of hemlock trees
With one wheel in my hands and four more on the road
And you, you’re hanging out of the window
One days, we’ll be married to different people
And any stills you keep’ll keep us still until
You take the future and leave me with the past
Photographer friend, photographer friend
Some things they never last

You’ll see the future change the colour of the past
Photographer friend, Photographer friend
Some things they never last

I’m long gone, honey babe, far away from my home
went out to find myself, just found myself alone
Late night trains since don’t run the way they’re supposed to
It’s been months since I’ve been near anyone I was close to
At the end of the line, wildflowers grow on the track
I’d return to the cities of my youth if I knew the youth’d come back

I was holed up in my hotel, I got a telephone call
Girl down in the lobby, girl I didn’t know at all
Her last night in the city and her friends left her behind
She had some thoughts and a bottle of wine
could she come up and talk a while
But Lord I know what talking leads to

At the end of the line, I had only one thought
Whenever something’s free, usually then you’re not

F-train to Coney Island, corridor to my room
Yellow wine in summer, the subway’s sweet perfume
Its in the air around m clothes, it’s in the bookstores you lived above
Sometimes a city is one too many, and a thousand ain’t enough

At the end of the line I’m reading to myself
Of all the spring afternoons in bare, could it have been anybody else

I walked all along Laugawegur’s length
Heard the Salvation Army Band
Went into cafe Bernnslan
I had a vodka and orange juice

A wildfire took down Rosenberg
And as it burned the kettles boiled
Fire, cold water, engines oiled
My coat was fat just like a goose

I can’t be so sure
Down by the shore
I’m gonna go straighten out my blood

I was having a smoke out in the snow
You can never trust the folks you know
You were in the bath talking about your sister
As I hung out on the banister
Why would I steal what you’d still own
My mind is sealed, my lips are blown
An invitation to your unveiling
With a green Munch behind the railing
It’s not your fault, you’re not to blame
Enthusiasm always wanes
Now I’m staring at your shirtsleeves
And they’re looking like parentheses

Last time I saw you, you’d seen my name in the paper
You shook my hand, wished me luck, said you had to go
Now it’s my turn to see your name in the paper
Said you were leaving but how was I supposed to know

You always did do things first and I guess this is no exception
It’s the direction we all take in time
Ever since you were a kid the world was never all that kind
But you always were, always will be, a friend of mine

In T.O. I was laughing
At my friend who sold his soul
I guess it wouldn’t've been so funny had I not sold mine for less
Orange smokestacks in the sunset casting shadows until our faces drowned
It’s better to have left and laughed than never to have left at all
I found myself on a subway coming above the ground

I used to tango
But that, that was then
I danced too close to the band that’s how I got this ringing in my ears
And sometimes I just can’t sleep from the sound
I can’t hear it during the day, It’s just at night or when things get quiet
Like when the subway comes above the ground

In Tennessee, I went looking
For someone to throw me against the wall
I wanted to be inspired until disheartened, spend the money I’d hard-earned
Oh, just to see his name with flashing yellow lights bulbs all around
But he left us in the Mississippi
He wasn’t even thirty-one
If only he’d come up like a subway from the ground

In springtime, I was standing
With a brown dog by my side
I was sweating I was staring at Mayan ruins
Then I was next to you on that bus going straight out of town
From Memphis and Nashville to New York City
Your jaw was wide and pretty
And you turned to me and said, “Am I in ruins like the outskirts of the city where all the subways come above ground?”
And I said no

In Iceland, it was festival season
And I went knocking at your door
You opened up and there you were
With the hale of the porchlight you were crowned
We stayed up all night
Phrases fading like countryside in the rearview mirror
I was hoping that one day you’d be next to me or at least somewhere near
When the subway comes above the ground

Well, the windows fogged up and the world it did freeze
With its restless passerby in the cold nighttime breeze
The violins dug in and one tear I cry
My ears were ringing when we stepped outside
Your sweat sweetly mixed with the sea salt air
Oh, I was glad when we decided to get out of there
And looking down the avenue
You said there’s only one cure for that ringing I hear

You were talking so close I could see and feel your breath
You smiled and told me that cure was death
You were always pretty clever, much more than you’d let on
Your kind of thinking was dead on
It takes two to tango, it took one to teach
You were in my arms but you were out of reach
And the windows fogged up and outside we did freeze
Amongst the restless passerby in the cold nighttime breeze

Evert now and again when I go out at night
I pass by some stranger who asks for a light
And her handwriting it don’t match up to yours
You said that all lamps are lit by one kind of fire
But in some kinds of light I just can’t call you a liar
And in the wine bottle bars and in the late night dawn
I often wonder which side of the glass you’re now on