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lyrics

Monday


I


When the house starts to vibrate
In anticipation of the night
And the zucchini, breaded and ready
On the baking sheet, neatly arranged,
Waits for its plunge into the Red Sea

I see Charlton Heston as Moses
Spilling marinara sauce on his red robe
Hoping no one will notice
Amidst all the miracles



II


After leaving that house
Towards my bed of down and sleeping dog,
I found I was left with a sweet scent
Somewhere on the right side of my face
Hiding below or just along my jaw line

In secret moments I turned my head
On the unsuspecting scent to catch it,
And each moment was a gift
From a friend I held
Or a leg I rested my head on
Or a parting embrace to celebrate
The practice of gathering

It was a sweet soft spice like a nameless
Orange flower with its dark eye staring at the sun,
It was my father's desk drawer
When I asked him for a glue stick when I was five

He kept a salve like tiger balm inside
Which scented the pencils of my childhood,

With which I drew my first picture
Of a dog that would later be asleep on my bed,
With which I practiced my backwards letters
That would later become this poem


//


The Library


While I was in the library
Finding words that rhyme with ivory
(I've fallen for piano keys)

My friends were outside picking blackberries

While they were weeding the beds of garlic
I was reading a book about farmers
Who couldn't find work

I hope you're hungry my dear,
For I have words to share,
Some truth to confess:

I dress my best
Seven days a week
And I study the way
Roscoe Holcomb speaks
And the way Texas Gladden
Ends her notes by adding
Sudden mountain peaks

The ballads and storms endured
And forms that changed -
I hold the remains as though
America's past was cremated
But the ashes in the urn
Can't alleviate the fact
That we've been burned

While I was in the library
Searching for a word
The ivory keys became plastic

The flag was at half-mast
For the passing of the wilderness
And my friends were locked up
For stopping construction equipment

While I was in the library

The world spun around me
And I finally found my word,
Dressed like me, singing songs
For the last bird of its kind,
For the migrant workers hiding,


For my friends pulling silver fruit
Off starry vines,

Saying,
“Here, take this star,
Take it to the library
And we'll read beneath its light
A hundred years from now”

credits

from Affirmations and Storms Returning, released May 5, 2018

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Eric George Burlington, Vermont

Eric George is a Vermont-based songwriter, sound engineer, and performer of original music and poetry. One of the most prolific folk musicians of the Northeast music scene, he is intent upon maintaining the integrity of American folk music while taking a contemporary approach to songwriting. ... more

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