Goose Eggs

B               F#                      A
What we built, at the kiln that won’t be stilled
        G
Did not set well:
B                       F#
The old veil of desire
                        A
Like the vessels that we fired
        G
Fell thin as eggshells

Bm                      A
And every season, somebody burns
Downtown, taking turns–
C                               G
Taking a bus, to take a train and just plain vamoose

Bm                                      A
Now the wind blows coals over the hills. Honey
I’ve been paying my bills
C                                       G
But honey it’s been a long time since I’ve come to any use

Bm
And it hurt me bad, when I heard the news
D
That you’d got that call, and could not refuse
A                                               E
(A goose, alone, I suppose, can know the loneliness of geese
E                               D                       A               F#m
Who never find their peace, whether North, or South, or West, or East, West or East;
E
And I could never find my way
D                                       A
To being the kind of friend you seemed to need in me
G               F
Till the needing had ceased.)

B               F#                      A
Recently, a bottle of rye, and a friend, and me,
              G
on our five loose legs,
B                       F#
had a ramble, and spoke
                        A               G
of the scrambling of broken hopes, and goose eggs,
Bm                      A
and a stranger, long ago.
(Not you, honey! You, I know.)
C                               G
We just spoke of broken hopes and old strangers.
Bm                                      A
Now the wind blows coals over the sea.
Tell you what, honey: you and me
C                                       G
Better run and see if we can't contain them, first.

Bm
But you had somewhere that you had to go,
D
and you caught that flight out of Covalo.
A                                      E
Now, overhead, you’re gunning in those Vs,
E
where you had better find your peace,
   D                       A               F#m
whether north, or south, or west, or east. West, or east.
E
And I had better find my way
D                                       A
to being the kind of friend you seemed to need in me,
G               F
at last (at least).

E
What’s redacted will repeat,
D                                       A
and you cannot learn that you burn when you touch the heat,
             F#m
so we touch the heat,
E
and we cut facsimiles of love and death
D                                       A
(just separate holes in sheets
G                                      F
where you cannot breathe, and you cannot see).

E                                         D
And I cannot now, for the life of me, believe our talk—
     A
our flock had cause to leave,
     F#m    E   D
but do we? do we?