Scarlet and Other Stories Lyrics

Dream Now
The sun is low and the grass is tall
We're butterflies on a garden wall
I am she as you are he
And nowhere will they find us now

Dream now
And find you're not dreaming at all

Reality can cast his net
Come fly away! We can't let him catch us yet
We're fireflies heading for the clouds
To where they'll never find us now

Dream now
I'm calling your name
Can you hear me
So far away from you
Far from home?
Gold and Silver
Love child
Sugar and spices scattered all around you
Stay awhile
Say something strange and someone may believe you

What do you get when you give your love?
It can't be gold
you can't be sold
It can't be silver
'cause silver never pleased you

Like hanging around the flowers
Like honeybees do
With dark eyes
Glistening with tears
'cause heaven still eludes youScarlet
Dress me in scarlet
Ribbons and bows so everyone knows
I'm hiding a face
that hadn't the grace to go free
Dress me in shadows
Sad April skies have opened my eyes
to the lie that I live
And given the river away
I'll change these clothes if I want to, and I do

I think that I've found out
what no-one's about to tell me
I think that I've found out
I don't wear scarlet well

Waiting before me
Poets and painters may say
``When will you stumble our way
Kick off your red shoes and fly now''
I'll die for their words if I want to, and I do

Always before me
Poets and sages may say
``We've been lamenting your fall
And carving it all into stone here
And skimming them into the river, just for you''

I think that I've found out
what no-one's about to tell me
I think that I've found out
the place where angels fell from
I thing that I've found out
I don't wear scarlet well
December
There's a Victorian tin I keep my memories in
I found it up in the attic
After looking inside I find the things that I'm hiding
The leaves saved from a mistletoe kiss
Only nostalgia has me feeling like this
Like I miss you
It must be the time of year

Remember December
It's like a wintergreen beside a diamond stream
Remember December
A fall of snow and the afterglow
It could be taking our breath away
but the years stand in the way
Remember December
How does it make you feel inside?

Beneath a Valentine, I see a locket is shining
I think it must be the wine
makes me feel it's all real
Where nothing seems to rhyme
To breathe life into the dust of a keepsake
I might as well try to fix a chain on a snowflake
or a heartache
It must be the time of year

Should I feel this alone, should I pick up the phone
Should I call up and wish you `Happy Christmas'?
I feel so alone, should I pick up the phone
Take my heart in my hand
and ask if you remember
Blind Lemon Sam
Lady Jane had a castle in Spain
Caviar and a second car
'cause she's married to a film star
Children they had, always good, never bad
Life's a peach, she had one of each
And a house beside the beach, oh Jane

You'd better wake yourself
and shake yourself on up
Look in a looking-glass
and see the past you know

So many fingers pull at the fabric of your dreams
and by the sundial it seems
time's come to live a real life

Blind Lemon Sam, he's a blues man
He lives in a shack by the rail track
and Janie's got her bags packed
She's moving in-- she believes she loves him
Life begun and they had some fun
and they made a lot of love and raised a son

You'd better pinch yourself
Convince yourself it's real
You'd better look around
at the happiness you found

Sam passed away and Janie cried all day
She turned for love to the Lord above
'cause that's all that she could think of to do
More than the Blues
Won't you let your hair down
Won't you kick your shoes off
Maybe shake the blues off a while
Or even crack a smile?
Are you reading fortunes
or just reading Nietzsche?
Find another teacher
He ain't worth an apple

But it takes more than the blues to bring me down
Like a lonely house in a nowhere kind of town
A hole in the sky where the rain comes tumbling down
It'll take more than the blues to bring me down

So you like to worry?
You'd better kick the habit
Better reach and grab it
When you feel the sunshine
Are we getting wiser
Or just getting older
When we know the shoulder
we'd most like to cry on

Tuesday's Child
Sunday, Sunday, where have you been
Your emerald eyes
like your hands, reaching out to me?
The wolves are out tonight
Under the hunter's moon
Cinnabar staining the hem of her lace
She's starting to blush
but the moon helps to pale her face
``The groom has gone'', she sighed
and slept for a hundred years

Sunday's child and the wolf were wed
to Monday's child with her empty head
Tuesday's child seemed to know the answer

Sister Monday, what did you find?
``I found it all
but somehow I lost my mind
East of the universe
and north of a snowbound star
Oberon told me: `The devil lives there!'
Maybe he stole it
and it could be anywhere
One soul in silent millions
trying to get back home''Pieces of our Heart
I had a dream that we were skating
The ice was thin and we were waiting to fall right in
However deep the truth is hidden
once you know it's still forbidden

It doesn't feel right
We can throw it away
And pieces of our heart
remain unbroken

Just like the chain that binds us
Just like the rain that finds us sheltering again
Just like the chemistry
All woven into tapestry
by hands of Fate, and love and hate
and sad guitars and stars

If it feels right
we can't throw it away
They're pieces of our heart
we can't tear it apart
They're pieces of our heart
we never needed to know
And so we remain unspoken
Hard Spaniard
A red neon sign draws him
into a wine bar
where a woman is crying
Unaware of the whisky he's buying her
``Can I join you a while ma'am?''
``Honey, when you're as broken up as I am
You'd have to be Jesus to join up all these pieces''

The night before the morning after

``Are you here alone,
can I take you home?
It's a real disgrace
seeing your pretty face
in this ugly place''

A ride in a taxi
to a rented apartment in a back street
Whisky-bottle graveyard
Rent is low so she's trying to save hard
to get out of the city
it takes time but she won't take his pity
They carry on drinking
and she knows what he's thinking

And her stockings are torn
and the heels of her shoes are worn
She could be a waitress
she could be an actress
But he thinks she's a temptress

There's a space in her bed
where the stranger laid his head
She remembers him kissing her
He was such a good listener
But he sure won't be missing herThe Empty Dancehall
Ribbons from your dancing shoes
in shreds and threads and feeling used
are hanging up our yesterdays
Down the street, the empty dance halls
due to empty circumstance
all seem to be closed down today
And through the silence

I hear the word for love
I hear the word for death
But I don't hear any answer
While death can talk of `la mort'
and love can whisper `l'amour'
the floor has lost its dancers

Take your partner by the hand
and dance the ghost of a sarabande
Moving like a miracle
Shoe to shoe and cheek to cheek
Every day of every week
step by step by century
Through the silenceOnly One Reason
If there's Sunday in their eyes
and they can't disguise it
Half-sick of shadows grayer
than the fair Elaine knows
It's four hours after twelve
and you're scared of yourself
Feeling so afraid
like a child in an air-raid

And if there's only one reason
to live in this world
I'll find it
And if there's only one reason
to give of yourself
Ask the lonely and the dying

If your drowning in the doubt
as the candle goes out
Faces at the window
and a whispering that won't go
Focus on the dawn
and the promise of morning
Look ahead of winter
Let the breath of summer into you

They're always waiting for morning
Always waiting for light to come around
Always waiting for morning
and the light to come shining inThe Pearl Fishermen
The milkmoons dwell in their quiet shells
Where they fell from the heaven
Two pearl fishermen hold their breath again
Fight to the death again for the same prize

Oh my brother, one of us loses
One must drown and the other she chooses
The jade of the blue offers diamonds to you
But you find it's not true when the sun sets

You dive far below
Where the sun doesn't go
Where your brother won't know
And you hear her saying:

``Oh my lover, now that you've found me
Now your brother is bound to be drowned
I don't know why you'd feud over me
All those pearls lay asleep on the sea bed''

The pearl in his hand
She's just a grain of sand
She's dressed up as snow
in the moonlight

She's porcelain
on his sallow skin
He's been taken in
by illusion

Oh my brother, we're both of us losers
I don't know why she ever did choose us
To call one her lover and bury the other
So I'll hold my breath 'til the story is over