I took a beaten leather journal from the shelf above my bed and went sifting through the fragments of the former lives I’ve led in the years that stretch behind me like a roughly beaten path, all the hours, minutes, seconds that passed. Every time I chose a right or left the other road remained, like a softly curving question mark of pleasure or of pain, in the choose-your-own-adventure of my years upon this earth. Who knows what those turns were worth?
So I sing a hymn for what’s been lost, all the treasures and what they cost. Oh my god, what a ride. With the temerity to trade all the decisions I have made, I couldn’t say if I’d be on the losing side.
Well my knowledge ain’t that carnal and my memory’s obsolete. I’ve got two minds going sideways, and they can’t help but compete. I’m never bad enough to push things as far they can go, but I’m not good enough to leave them alone. So I got great at crossing borders but remained in no man’s land. I went all-in holding nothing and I folded winning hands, but I’d like to think I minimized the damage here and there. Just don’t make me say where.
So I sing a hymn for what’s been missed, all the sordid secret trysts. Oh my god, what the hell. As if I’d turn into a joke every song I ever wrote because it might put a few more notches in my belt.
I spent years on raspy poetry and thumping my guitar in the ivy-covered colleges and Music City bars. And the money-men were circling always just a room away, keeping better ideas at bay. Well, they never offered anything that I could not refuse. I guess we always disagreed on whether I had much to lose. So I shook the meager promises of glitterati fame and I shouldered all the blame.
So we sing a hymn for bullets dodged and whatever lay behind that façade. Oh my god, what a relief. I’ll not go kicking with a scream into the jaws of mediocrity, forever flashing cameramen my teeth.
When you reunite with secrets then you’re walking on a wire, so make peace with some exposure, or make peace with being a liar. Open portals at your peril. Keep in mind what rules apply. Always ask the question, “Why?”
So you can weep for all the enemies who started off as friends, weep for all the places that you’ll never see again. You can weep for all the certainty you lost throughout the years, but no one’s going to dry your tears.
credits
from Dead Messengers,
released March 20, 2020
Marc M Cogman - lead and backing vocals, acoustic guitar
Steve McDonald - electric guitar, backing vocals
Giulio Carmassi - B3 Organ, piano, trumpet, backing vocals
Frogs - upright bass, backing vocals
Brian Moskin - drums, backing vocals
J Siegel - percussion, backing vocals
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