1. |
No Monongahela Here
10:44
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Brother, I invite you to manifest this song
as a castle here unfolding where no castle should belong
A balustrade of stanza hands a chorus to the sun,
and the brotherhood of sawmills sings along
Tower nine to golden lion...do you read me, golden lion?
Rust on railway / vines on causeway / canyon rising / daylight dying.
River don't remember who you are
but lions live in castles round your heart
If you don't believe me I've got pictures of it all
No Monongahela here, just rivers made of gold
A colonnade comes running where the Allegheny rolled
Don't ask no hunter plainly where his quarry lopes along,
cause if the question is Ohio, then the answer shoots a gun
And I'm climbing up these canyons here to find my songs again
But I'm starting off unsteady here in Introductionland
cause I dropped the verses, chorus, and the fade out on the floor
but I am bound to try my damnedest now to make it like before
All hands out to Ohio / godspeed, Allegheny
No, I'd never surrender no Monongahela to thee
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2. |
The Gateless Garden
06:26
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When Jane went to gather the sawdust she saw
where the claws of the Grizzly were marking the wall
She said, “Don't be so angry, I'll bandage your paw, you are bleeding.”
The garden stood gateless, defying the few
that would graze there, regarding the glory that grew
from the beds of dead brethren, flowers entombed in the evening
“Oh, that damnable garden's not for you or I–
It's a bastion of death, it's a place for all creatures to die,
but if I were a terminal thing I would go there
One day I'll deliver myself unto ashes;
my lamplighting mother and bullfighting dad
will ungladly unravel, no choice may they have in the matter.”
The Captain: "So carve, carve your crumbling armor from me
Two mumbling martyrs in infinite ardor are we
Oh darkness, relinquish your charging advances and flee
May your cavalry carry your slain and unslain to the changeless, irascible sea."
"So throw all your sadnesses up in the sky
and command no more distance between you and I;
I'd reverse your resistance if I could be yours for the keeping."
She said, “I'd be happy to hang on your sleeve
and parade through the town as your homecoming queen
We'll careen down the avenue, haven't you sung what you're speaking?"
"So show me your kingdom, I'll show you my soul.
Row me down your deep rivers, I'll show you the holiest
place in my citadel, should I compel you to stay there.”
Oh but Jane, they would scrawl me such damning decrees,
and they'd drag me down corridors one, two and three,
they would chain me and quarter this cowering carcass to fanfare!"
The Grizzly: "And as sure as your bone and its gristle divide,
oh your garden's a thistle, a thorn in my side,
and I'll rage at the wall in my scornful and sad desperation
My chalice is empty as yours will be full
of the blood of a bastard who bended the rules,
till they broke and the pieces flew out in a true constellation."
The Captain: "Would you see us then as brothers? Would you see us then as friends?
Would you see us as we drag you up the mountainside again?"
"Save your bravery, save it for war!
See the wave as it crests and it crashes, lambasting the shore!
Stave, oh stave your attack or they'll capture you whole,
with your anger inscribed on the bell that you balefully toll."
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3. |
Stonemason's Son
03:09
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The dead hand, the sawmill air
My father, floating down the stair
Lone apostle, shield me
Fearing spilleth over, I swear
I ain't no stonemason's son
I ain't no stonemason's son
Let's leave here, let's save ourselves
Those godforsaken lamps on every street,
well, they can light themselves
I sing no lamplighter's song,
like you ain't no stonemason's son
I ain't no stonemason's son
I ain't no stonemason's son
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4. |
Open Season
04:07
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Lamplighter Anne, she works her hands down to the bone;
I hear she's lonely as the oxen pulling bodies in their chariots of stone
Jane, I wrote a song about her name to stake my claim
upon her valleys and Virginias, sleeping canyons overcame
Well it's open season, that's the reason why I'm running
Yeah it's open season on me!
I'm terrified and freezing with my bandage all undone
and it is open season on me!
My heart is pounding, heavy set! My spirit leaves its oubliette!
I'm fearful to the fearsomest degree!
I'm passing out in poison oak; the lamps you lit unmade me,
don't forsake another sawmill amputee!
I'm dragging daughters away with me
We're crossing deep waters away from thee
I'm dragging daughters you'll never see again,
and I love your daughter. And I love your daughter
It's open season, that's the reason why I'm running
Yeah it's open season on me!
I'm terrified and freezing with my bandage all undone
and it is open season on me!
And I am carrying your daughter through the wreckage that I wrought;
I'll let her sleep inside my armor if she needs
And though every day I'm fearing, man, there ain't no fear so fearsome
it could scare the living lions out of me
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5. |
Bullfighter's Union
04:58
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Well I spent more time in the bullfighters union
than you have spent breaking a stallion or two.
My daughter's a maiden who ain't worth the saving
'less saving's a service you horsebreakers do.
I ain't got no money, I'll give you my graveyard
My mother wore silver when they buried her there.
My stump-legged father enshrined in his armor,
there's gold in his jawbone worth more than I care.
They say when you die you become constellations
unwinding the way for us all,
but the dead do not pay you a nickel for bearing their pall.
No, the dead keep their silence;
the dead do not thank you at all.
Though I see that you're dying, I declare you unable
to sit at the dead singer-songwriter's table.
The song that your heart wrote was green and disheveled—
a reverie written for none.
You sang of the bull what was bleeding out strong,
in terminal darkness it limped its way on,
and its horns were still dripping with the blood of our hero,
who hangs from an alder and rots in the sun.
All hands out to Ohio / godspeed, Allegheny
No, I'd never surrender no Monongahela to thee
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6. |
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Wake up, little brother. Sound the horn but do not shudder,
for the grizzly got inside the gateless garden.
Well he ate up all our sentries till the battlements were empty,
and he brutalized the wall until it tumbled to the ground.
Was it luck that brought the arrow from the archer to the marrow
of the bone between the creature's frightened eyes?
So let the heartbeat swell within ya, there ain't no kingdom like Virginia.
There ain't no archer bears a mark upon his name.
And from the citadel to landfill, from the weathervane to windmill,
hangs a banner which our noble kill proclaims.
Oh brother, do not sanctify your shame.
Look out on what your gateless wall became.
And the grizzly walks among us down the corridor in chains,
the blameless words he offers always are the same:
"Well I'm mighty pleased to meet ya, am I dead or in Virginia?
For the arrow that had got me did not sting.
Well I'm weary as I oughtta be, my bloodless wound forgotten,
see the bandage from my heart unraveling?"
And I bade the sunlight bear the shade away,
for the garden is so beautiful today.
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7. |
Archer on the Causeway
04:08
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8. |
The House of St. Oxblood
00:28
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(Instrumental)
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9. |
Trapdoor Canyon
03:56
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Crow, gimme back my eye. Come forth, for it is not thine
We lost another season in hell, sweet daughter of Israel
Oh Jenny, have you ever sang the blues?
Have you felt faith abandon you?
Did you learn to love those canyons where they sent you to?
Did you drag your enemies in tow?
Did you know your anger makes it so?
Did a lion leave you, dear, with lantern guttering low?
Lord, sun's so bright, turning your oxblood white
Though sightless, I navigate fine
Bandage, oh bandage my eye
Asleep in the orange trees,
oh the arbor's uneasy in the ominous season
“You'll find your eyes where the glory goes,”
said six and seventeen border crows,
“It's time to see what comes around—
this trapdoor canyon's coming down!”
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10. |
Dead Coyote Pass
03:46
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Nine, nine, Orion I am blind, I fear
Hide, hide, the dead coyote lingers here
So we called on the dove to imbue it with love,
in the hollows where stitches were coming undone
But the song to her seemed such a frail tapestry,
and the inscription upon it was “None.”
Three, three birds in winter trees
Stag, stag, muddy hooves you drag,
oh, they shot you in the lung
And here—here my soul divides!
One piece that I'll feed to the dark, and one to the light
I am the dead coyote man, you will fear me as I am
I'll forever hold your kingdom in my dead coyote hand
I am the dead coyote man. I am the dead coyote man
Look not for lions in this land, strike up the dead coyote band!
"I will pull your guts out from you
I will pull your gods out from you
I will pull your guts out from you
and I'll wear ‘em as a crown!"
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11. |
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No one sings the sawmill fast asleep,
cause it's just a groaning catacomb of sad machinery.
But there ain't no way to put to rest the silver saws and broken press—
sleep forgets the sawmill anyway.
Sawmills saw together out of tune, sawing out a blanket made for you.
Motors whine a hymn undying, hammers falling, shrapnel flying,
sleep was manufactured here for you.
No one asks the sawmill when it's tired,
cause it's just a heap of flaking rust and fraying wires.
But it don't mind, it's not the kind to bellyache.
Sleep forgets the sawmill anyway.
(Deep within a dream I saw a wagon winding westward,
worried horses blindly weaving through the foothills of the damned:
perilous, drunk and savage from the voyages beyond,
they champ the sands at the bottoms of canyons
burning red against the sun.)
Sawmills saw together out of tune, sawing out a blanket made for you.
Motors whine a hymn undying, hammers falling, shrapnel flying,
sleep was manufactured here for you.
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12. |
The Stairless Tower
06:26
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Here I am—your coward's blood and body mine to rend!
And of the necks that needed opened here,
well, I would number mine among them, dear.
Cause I'm the lion left to live behind your eyes,
and I'm the tower blaspheming your skies!
All hands out to Ohio, godspeed, Allegheny.
No, I'd never surrender no Monongahela to thee.
So long, Virginia—my heart is green.
Below the tower, we fell to thee.
Belay my vessel, belay my crime.
I was her captain, when Jane was mine.
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13. |
Gone Ocean Ending
08:45
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Hey, what have you saved for me?
Has our citadel signaled its final hurrah?
Has the sawmill forgotten its flume?
Them rusty bells ringing a toll on our hearts
as the archer abandoned his tomb:
all shakingly slack-jawed, he shambled along
down a corridor ending in gloom,
where chain'ed and ghostly, our grizzly was dozing
in gathering gold afternoon.
“Well, I thought I was some kind of hero,” he (The Archer) said,
“and the shoulders I rode said the same.
So stairlessly looming, such towers consumed
all the virtue that lived in my name.
So sanction me some absolution, my friend,
though I warrant no grain of reprieve.
And pardon the path that my arrow sought out
as it sailed from my anger to thee.
But weren't we lucky to live and be known?
But weren't we lucky, my friend?”
Unguarded, it lists along harbors uncharted,
the last living lion unknown.
These christian bodies by lamp-light were shown,
but no supper was made of their bones.
No kingdom is empty of anger, my friend,
and no gardens live gatelessly on.
And each gone ocean ending we fell down defending
appeared to us once and were gone...
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Saint Deadmule Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Mostly an illustrator, but I make music sometimes. Lots more to come!
twitter.com/saintdeadmule
www.redbuffalo.org
instagram.com/redbuffaloill
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