Between Two Churches

Come Out of the Rain

Angel with your head down in a storm
I know the lonely place you’re running from
So have I got to tell you
It’s alright to start again
Say when and baby come out of the rain

You’ve been inside your head for far too long
Come live inside your life before it’s gone
I know you want to tell me it comes on like a tidal wave
Hold tight and baby, come out of the rain

I’d pull down the sky for you
Try all that I cannot do
And I’d steal a line from “angel eyes” as we sit and watch the water rise
Counting as you break the ties hold angels to their wings

Angel with your heart turned inside out
There’s no silent running in reality
You’ve got to let your number count
And though it’s like to choke you
And comes on a like a hurricane
Walk straight and
Baby, come out of the rain

Cold Chicken Skin

Shirt’s all torn and I’m lame
If I try to smile (it) hurts my face
All I hear is complaint but who left this mess on my plate?

Oh I will fade away on…watch my hair turn grey on
Cold chicken skin and dog tail soup
Tell me is that all I’m worth to you?
Cold chicken skin and dog tail soup
Is that all that I bring you?

Inside out from cocaine
Got a bird on a rush in your brain
Wild eyed singing your song
Calling out my name like you’re pulling it along

Yo yo look on your face
What you got in that bag,hair and nails?
What’s that splashed on the walls?
The top half of a dog
And that’s all… !

Charlemagne

Blind barking Bobby he can rage
The red mist come down and take centre stage
And if he could see he’d knock you down
And he may yet if you stick around

The sunlight only happens when he dreams
The cold light of day is how it’s gonna stay
Some thing’s only happen ‘cause it rains
It takes another kind for taking up the strain and
Be Charlemagne

He’s looking out not looking in
Don’t have to deal with where you’re looking
One more human face to fill your mind
And where the shadows fall…
You dare not find

Teenage Wall

Look out mama I’m coming through
It don’t mean to me what it won’t for you
Burn your brassiere and your high heeled shoes, yeah
When you’ve nothing left
You’ve got something to lose.
If your hair is long and your soul is free
Come on come on come running to me
But you’ve heard it all before
The teenage wall

Look out mama I’m coming through
Just about learned what this thing can do
Teenage werewolf mating call……
Then you’re sitting there looking,
Looking like I’ve got just enough left to be still in decline
I’m just about ready to blow
The teenage wall

Speak to the face
And not to the hand
I’ve got nothing to say that you’d understand

You got the wrong girl,you made the wrong call
Everyone thought you were too old to fall
But you’re waiting on her to call
Yes you are
Sitting there looking
Looking like I’ve got just enough left to be still in decline
I’m just about ready to blow
The teenage wall

Same Mistake Twice

Is there something going on I don’t know about yet?
There is something going on around here
I don’t know why you’re laughing
Don’t know why you cry
Don’t know what you’re thinking as you look in my eyes
You don’t know what you want is this the same mistake
Twice?

There is something going on I don’t know about yet
There is something going on around here
I don’t know when you’re leaving, don’t know where you go
It’s killing me to follow but that’s where I want to go
To not know what you want is like the same mistake twice

I love it when you’re angry
I love it when you play
I love it when you offer
I love it when you rain
I love it when you scare me
I love it when you smile
I love it when you’re frightened
I love it when you hide

In a Heartbeat

I wish she’d leave me alone
Like I know she would if she saw me alone sitting
On a barstool looking back at her
And I couldn’t hide the hunger from her
Should I leave?
In a heartbeat
Sha la la la don’t mean I love you…….

And sometimes you dream of home
But like a lover that’s a long time gone
And she’s so unknown,when you thought you knew
What you try to put in words as if it’s words you understood
Should I leave?
In a heartbeat
Sha la la la don’t mean I love you…….

Change, keep changing
Turn it inside out
Turning it from what it is to what it was about
Staking what you never had and never want to lose
Strip your shoes and cut your feet on what you’re going
Through
The last time was the first time but the first time never fades
Only exists inside a dream you never made

Sha la la la la la la la la la
Don’t mean I love you,
I wish she’d leave me alone

Two Churches

Born in nineteen sixty two
Born with eyes of a distant blue
Good luck charm was number one and playing on the radio
Now I’m about ready to lose myself
I’m about ready to kiss and tell,
Give up all that I think I know
Shed my skin and be ready to go through changes

I’m in no rush you can take your time
Show me yours and I’ll show you mine
Men’ll fuck mud and then call it love,
A joke salami in a latex glove
More than a little mixed up when God begins to speak
Through changes
When I have to go before St Peter I’ll knock on his neon door and say
Look at what came to be my journey
Between two churches

It’s like I came to a fork in the road
Four roads running only one of them known
Fell to my knees as if I was pushed
Love may come but it won’t be rushed by trying to run and stop from choosing
The changes
So when I have to go before St Peter I’ll knock on his neon door and say
Look at what came to be my journey
Between two churches

If You’re all Done Dying

Listen hell is freezing over
Walk on solid water
Put on your party shoes

I am the lonely soldier,homesick
In a war that can’t be won
And getting angry
If you’re all done dying
Can we get to dance?

I just began to stop resisting
No lack of resignation
The wheel turns also for the better
And the poet has my soul and
He may take it naked
And send my ass a picture
If you’re all done dying can we get to dance?

Let the moment be your throne
And sit there naked on it,write your heart a letter
If you’re all done dying
Can we get to dance?

If you’re all done dying… ?

Her Coat and No Knickers

You told a few lies and they came back on you
So you told a hundred more until she came back to you
But she only stayed a while
Just long enough to say the kind of things left to be said
In the cold light of day
And she smelled of Xmas trees, coffee and vanilla
Calcutta after snowfall, she’s no-one’s stand in mother
But I drifted into her like I could run myself aground
And keep her smiling at the sight of the blackness spilling out

And I don’t mind if you don’t care about it
I’ll get by without her arms around me
As long as I can sit on my own
In her coat and no knickers

I believe it doesn’t matter
So don’t look at me that way
Like I should notice how you look at me that way
That’s just the way you look when you look at me that way and I believe it
doesn’t matter
At least not much anyway

I never dreamed I could be lost in a place I know so well
But I was running on the spot in the darkness ‘til I fell
And then pulling off my clothes I want to step out of my skin
And paint a tattoo on my heart shows an arrow
Pointing in

Are You Having a Wonderful Life?

This was a song I wrote too many years ago
More than I’d like to know
Or want you to remember
Born in time to see the sixties die
Born too late to know what was so great
Or remember
The river ran round on the other side
Where it can never come back
Are you having a wonderful life?

I was the song I wrote before I thought to sing
Some of them thought there were other things I should do here
And you missed the rain until it started up
Standing outside with a paper cup in December
The river ran round on the other side
But it can never run back
Are you having a wonderful life?

The sound of wind rushing in the trees
Singing drunk on a trampoline in December
The river can run round the other side
But it can never run back
Are you having a wonderful life?

History of Rock ‘n’ Roll Part 1

Showered with offers at twenty one
By the age of twenty-two she is nearly long gone
They keep calling her the heir to the rock and roll crown
Man it weighed so heavy it was dragging her down
Wants it ‘til she’s got it then tries to run away
A hunger so deep it can never go away
No way to fill it, to turn down the dial below the limit
If she could only stop from crying

She says I love him, he’s the kind to be clever with
I’m ready, maybe soon make it better
She’s wanted him for so long she’s forgotten how it goes
This is the history of rock and roll

All fogged up can’t even see to drive
A ’44 magnum on the passenger side
Pops a tablet for the cramping but it just won’t fade
She starts hearing things he used to say;
To love you is to surrender, it’s the need to lose
To want to step inside a kind of raging feud
Between the sea and the sky, my head and my heart
And choosing which of them is tearing me apart

He says I want her, want her so much I can taste her
When I’m sleeping she’s the scale of the ether
How much is it worth if it is free I just don’t know
This is the history of rock and roll

Haunted by images, the planet’s turning
The sun going down on Mississippi burning
Only darkness has the power to make her open up her heart
And play it to the world as though they were only tears
For crying

We want the future
Maybe soon maybe never
When we’re ready…but we act like we hate it
How much is it worth if it is free we’ll never know
This is the history of rock and roll