Strange Currencies: A Podcast For Songwriters

Paradox World Sometimes at night I fall into soft shadows Because the way of the stray Is to shelter from harm Then the bread-truck is unloading While the birds are calling From perches above the boulevard It’s like an algorithm remembering your favorite song I’m ambivalent about sunlight Like when these gridlocked cars On narrow blocks sweat like battalions Led by someone terribly wrong And we’re in a paradox world Someone love me into submission A paradox world Someone guide my hand in composing This transmission A paradox world There’s always tomorrow until tomorrow Paradox World Time takes life, it doesn’t borrow Now the flakes fall at twilight With the streetlights turned on It looks like static in my vision Camouflages the crosswalk No one asks if I’m lonely They only stare like I don’t belong They might find I have old music inside If they ever wanted to talk Is it the scythe or the hood? Which they find so off-putting Sometimes they run, others just turn white As

Twilight of the Gods It wasn’t about hope They just couldn’t take a joke But they let you run your mouth Because it gave them more rope You said they’d remember your name For all the honor in literary fame But you wound up crying outside your mother’s In the rain Twenty-five years to retire An indefinite date to expire Almost got fired over a pothole Dad never taught you how to change a tire Twilight of the gods Overcome by the odds Blasting out the bad thoughts With the music in our cars Twilight of the gods Fate shuffled all our cards Is the mud deep enough To plant a basketball hoop in the yard? And what of your friend’s silver dreams? All the pool parties, beers, rehearsed scenes You’ve got to be slapped by real life To comprehend what fantasy means You always had a soft spot for Angela Even when she yelled at ya The flower in her hair Was a yellow chrysanthemum And her soulmate Blaine’s persistent tinnitus Combined with his chronic right shoulder bursitis Compromised

Paradigm

At The National Show A cloudless summer day Got off the wrong stop on the train Before the low-hanging night Was engulfed by rain I was walking through the park And the show decided to start Heard the man singing about soul And I moved nearer to take part Had ventured out solo Instead of staying home A few of my recent dates Were like talking to a stone I swear I felt you there And in my memory I see your hair Hanging off the back of a black raincoat You always say you’d never wear Isn’t it funny? How we almost met before we met That was a world ago At The National show I was so goddamn tired of being alone Aimless empire nights Patrolling shadows beneath the lights Staring into some tinted window Set at an unreachable height I emailed gibberish to my professors Because I was nobody’s successor I just couldn’t bridge that distance between Anonymous and successful It was like I could disappear Without having any there to get back here There was only rock and roll baseball To

When It Rains These Days Have you ever felt Like you were just watching your life? Staying alive Opting for flight instead of fight The hours pass They assume you have nothing better to do Than to pace in a room Speaking the untrue Lightening in the sky The twilight of the popular mind If the wind-up toys ever remember They made themselves blind And when it rains These days It feels like forever And when you ask When I might feel better I say, “maybe, baby, if we Get a change in the weather.” Have you ever known? You were throwing it away Based on a bill due to pay Tomorrow and yesterday For everything we want Because what we believe we need And compromise is an indignant child With an open mouth to feed Yet if you don’t participate They will find another Who wears your clothes, cashes your check And visits your mother And when it rains These days It feels like forever And when you ask When I might feel better I say, “maybe, baby, if we Get a change in the weather

Blunderland The streetlights glowed Chrystal white Against a confetti veil Of falling snow We looked to the left, looked to the right Picked nowhere in particular To go The champagne was nestled In the crook of your scarecrow arm We thought we’d spend The rest of our lives Never hearing an alarm Blunderland, Blunderland I guess it’s hard to understand How heavy reality rests In the palm of an ordinary man Blunderland There was a man dressed Like Santa Slumped against a blue mailbox His cotton-beard was decorated With an authentic December frost You leaned to touch his shoulder He acted like he’d been throttled He called you a cop And tried stealing your Cherry-tinted bottle Blunderland, Blunderland We got into our hotel And there was an isosceles On the wall You gazed upon The street beneath us Said, “it doesn’t feel like I thought.” So I held you from behind Put a peck on your left ear Told you, “You’ve only been Conditioned by cinema, my postmodern dear.” Blunder

Have I been too much of a cynical Yankees fan? Does it have to do with a 'Boomer mentality' that I subconsciously adopted?

Checking back-in with another Yankee-Centric episode!

The MLB All Star Game is a pretty flawed endeavor, even for a hardcore fan.

I’m launching a new podcast of bite-sized fragments of my life based upon the in-the-moment musings in my head. If you take the ride with me at any point, thanks for listening!

I’m launching a new podcast of bite-sized fragments of my life based upon the in-the-moment musings in my head. If you take the ride with me at any point, thanks for listening!

I’m launching a new podcast of bite-sized fragments of my life based upon the in-the-moment musings in my head. If you take the ride with me at any point, thanks for listening!

I’m launching a new podcast of bite-sized fragments of my life based upon the in-the-moment musings in my head. If you take the ride with me at any point, thanks for listening!

Paralyzed At the crosswalk sign And it’s telling me to move In this Balkanized Corporate paradise Consciousness is a fool On my way To a date With the anxious apparatus To plead my case And amend my mistake Of writing that ending Tragic Do you have an empty feeling? Can you play the part of hope? Was their dream worth believing? When you already had a coat? Satisfied By a momentary high After signing their contract Unrecognized Walking the Highline Alias intact We were running late To a play That was about our lives We did not know ourselves Everybody is somebody else And I still love the way you Survive Do you have an empty feeling? Can you play the part of hope? Was their dream worth believing? When you already had a coat?

Last night, They handed out awards To the sell-out whores God, I wish I were one of them At fading light, We wandered past stores With plywood front-doors And products we had to pretend Season of loss Season of tears Season where seasons Of the past truly recede Season of fury Season of doubt Season of quantifying What we can no longer Live without Last year, The unlucky and unsaved Were dropped in a mass grave Before an anonymous witness I could really feel My coping methods fail As the Molotov cocktail sailed Toward my sense of justice Season of loss Season of deceit Season where seasons of The boom met defeat Season of pity Season of rage Season of the ten-block radius Feeling like a cage Yesterday, A stranger said to burn down my neighborhood And many good people agreed they should While old reliable considered buying a gun I couldn’t say, Whether I’d die for the reform For victims and villains unborn Or if I

My body wakes at dawn Always obeys the first alarm I do what I’m told these days Automize to eliminate the doubt Rehearse the purpose they can't live without This is the kind of gig that pays Nobody’s in charge or wants the job We can’t elect a new god While still hauling biblical names World War pain They teach us to be sane When I train my sights on you It’s me being free World War pain What’s your favorite game? If you shoot me through the forehead Would you wonder what I dreamed? We’re each other’s targets tonight Only one will see the sunlight Seem to bless his lover’s eyes Soldiers don't question null Our local car was totally full Of political hacks parroting lies Do you also have empty night streets? Where distant traffic hums sweet relief From the vengeance born in our minds World War pain Has nothing to do with shame That’s for civilian life, where it is Essential to forgive World War pain Did you cauterize with flame? I wasted a second wondering If we’d let each other live

I Get to Live The sun hits my head And the depth of the rainbow Seems aligned in my eyes With the head of my shadow It is a summer afternoon And I have a handful of time To walk into stores And buy what is needed In the name of the hunger Which must be defeated I could have more The lenses of my sunglasses shine I hold my wife’s hand While we move through the darkness My accounts are in order But she’d love me regardless We look in each other’s eyes And kiss beside the street sign I get to live Isn’t it a privilege? I wasn’t a child in Rafah Whose innocence was given Zero consideration Upon detonation No one decides A forecast of rain And the sky is gunmetal I’m buying flowers With red and white petals The bouquet overflows I must hold it to the side Color which dies Is a compromise with beauty For we betray the principles That uphold love truly In the name of order and empire Repelling the killing tide My wife opens the door Softening the world with a smile She sh

A touch of the tragic May be conducive to magic But it’s a rock in the shoe Of ordinary life Never wanted it to happen Our branch bent before snapping Saw reality as an anomaly As our little tree struggled in the strife Upon the polished bar-slab Rests an old head who can’t pay his tab While his pocket chimes, a music box The last gift from his wife Well, life may be short I may be numb My country is Governed by a gun Hey, maybe it’s simple Maybe its not I could not work The way that you want If there’s a god If you’re a friend If there’s a story With an end I won’t forget When things were good I’ll someday figure out What I never understood Plinking my night symphonies The Detective wants his car keys Originals and standards No spotlight Couldn’t learn how to quit Months before you split Should’ve held you harder After that last flight Your father offered a good job And my pursuit’s run by the mob Why not grow-up, own property And bow out from a rigged fight? The sound of the keys Sends me,

What to say Another day Not crashing On the highway To surmise The compromise They’re idea Is somehow mine Salaried saint Ambition quaint Lift the mask Before we faint AM alarm The Knicks held on Against future Kings The worker trods I saw such lovely Colors In your Pictures Wondering If you escaped This shade of gray We earn money For the teenager’s Forgiveness Wondering If you drank the rain Without having to pay Ice-cut air Frost in your hair Kiss in the cold Beside the State Fair Where we visit But never miss it When home sweet home Discussing better business Then you’re out with friends And before it ends You’ve posed for photos And pressed send Our bedsheet seal Exclusive feel An electric pulsing Capacity to heal

My Inner-life’s centered Like a good conspiracy My back was turned overlong Toward some memory Where I was who they wanted to be Faded photograph Wrapped in a robe outside The church I wrote these words Corporate daddy Told me their worth It was dignified work Contaminated future bats Hanging in a cave But drink up your idealism And think positive thoughts Today Cause someone will Pay Riding out the rain In my mind Underground Guess I could’ve been someone else If I weren’t so proud To make this sound I need an intruder Nothing is not wrong I’ve serenaded this brick wall Through seven cycles of dawn Internally rage at betrayal While grinding up the seaside fortress It’s a strange trip for a lapsed Catholic kid Uncovering what the secular worship The downtown world, the better future The hijacked producing an exception I took notes on their lesson How home should be a weapon Well this guy from Queens Don’t self-destruct Because fate disobeyed I walked my dog, I rollerbladed Watc