The Gilmores

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American Elegance

Ulysses S. Grant told his doctor
Fact is I think I'm a verb
A verb is anything that signifies to be
To do, to suffer
Fact is, I signify all three

Allen Iverson is a verb meaning
To get from here to there
Like that!  (The way he did it)
Your game is what you are

Sister Edward Mary played the autoharp for us
Though not like Kilby Snow
But even so, even so

I was never afraid of anything living
Was what the gunslinger told me
Except for ghosts
And now I've outlived that

The pure products of America go crazy
Wrote the kindly physician
But, Josie, I'm still feeling pretty good
For an old man in my condition

Got to find some peace and quiet
I've been listening to John Cage
There is the real American elegance
Said Pablo Picasso while gazing upon Honest Abe

Torturetown

I raised them with the tears of my eyes
Look how these devils came and took them
They were just gone, overnight


These are tales told, verbatim, in Torturetown
Torturetown, Torturetown
These are tales told in Torturetown


Many people were tortured more than me
I just wanted to save my soul
I wonder why they did it


These are tales told, verbatim, in Torturetown
Torturetown, Torturetown
These are tales told in Torturetown

Why does one human being
Want to break the soul of another?
My son accepts his destiny
   as something already written


These are tales told, verbatim, 
   in Torturetown
Torturetown, Torturetown
These are tales told 
   in Torturetown






Well might you ask
Where is this Torturetown?
Well might you ask
Where can it be found?
Well might you ask
Where is this Torturetown
Well might you ask
Where can it be found?
Not all that far away from here
Somewhere right close around
Somewhere where your flight touches down

I don't know who that is
I don't know who that is
I told you I don't know who that is
I don't know who that is
I don't know who that is
I told you, I don't know who that is


Interrogation
Elimination
Termination
Liquidation
Salvage


Interrogation
Elimination
Termination
Liquidation
Salvage

Reason

To look at anything straight
With any degree of honesty
Is to be mad
Divorced of context
Nothing can withstand such scrutiny

Consider: The incivility of mirrors
The angularity of time
The power of snow
The justice of loneliness
The insularity of caution
The risk of daylight
The tenure of confidence
The intricacy of breath
The honor of mendacity





There are times I rage, times I tremble
Sometimes it's time to go up on the bridge and blow your horn
I couldn't shoot down a mad dog in the middle of the street

Patti

Dance the dance

Trance the trance

Trance the dance

Dance the trance

Host the host

Ghost the ghost

Ghost the host

Host the ghost

Play the play

Gray the gray

Gray the play

Play the gray

Time the time

Rhyme the rhyme

Time the rhyme

Rhyme the time

Eye the eye

Why the why

I the I

Eye the why

Why the I

I the why

I the eye

Why the eye

Eye the I

Overcome

        Come over

Pittsburgh, Schizophrenia

For every mill, a flower

And for me

The End of Days

Guys named Bud who work for
   the town
Volunteer firefighters in SUVs
Hey Shorty, name that tune for the
   month of June
DMX has been spotted in Applebees


The sirens are crying and the cops
   are flying
They're all going different ways
Sinatra lost her to the summer wind
We all get a little desperate at the
    end of days


They're all real big and most of it's muscle
Their caps are on backwards but their heads are on straight
They look a little like Buddhas but not so serene
One for my baby, one for the road, one just because it's getting late


The sirens are crying and the cops are flying
They're all going different ways
The piano man says only the good die young
We all get a little desperate at the end of days

The bartender's kind of heavy but
     she's real sweet
The waitresses are all like family
The guys are too old and the girls
     are too young
Nothing's as pretty as what's
    on the TV






The sirens are crying and the cops are flying
They're all going different ways
Twenty, twenty-four hours to go, I need
    to be sedated
We all get a little desperate at the end of days

The Yankees won, the Mets lost
This Sunday is said to be the Pentecost
Everyone in here is already speaking in tongues
They don't understand though it's all the same one


The sirens are crying and the cops are flying
They're all going different ways
Can't you see, can't you see, what that woman
    been doing to me?
We all get a little desperate at the end of days

The swimming coach pours a shot of Bacardi
    into his Corona
He turns the bottle upside down and covers it
    with his thumb
God bless the McGuckins and the girl halfway
    down with the long dark hair
Who tells her phone, I don't know, he got kind
    of weird when I asked if I could come

The sirens are crying and the cops
    are flying
They're all going different ways
Get up, stand up, stand up for
    your rights
We all get a little desperate at the
    end of days


Coyotes on the firehouse lawn
Clouds of bats returning home
Crows up on the telephone wire
Taunting me for being so alone


The sirens are crying and the cops are flying
They're all going different ways
Lord I was born a ramblin' man
We all get a little desperate at the end of days

Runner

Last night I slept in a doorway
The rain was soft and fair
The utilities were digging up the street
But none of them saw me there


Cause I was like a Tarahumara
Like a Tarahumara
Like an Indian
Like an Indian
Like a ghost in the canyon where
    the conquistadores
Have never even been
Like a Tarahumara
Like a Tarahumara
Like an Indian
Like an Indian


Then one of them noticed me
And they all got kind of nervous
Don't know if it was cause I was still here
Or because I had no need for the service


Cause I was like a Tarahumara
Like a Tarahumara
Like an Indian
Like an Indian
Drifting like a cloud across the mountainside
With the wildfire still blazing
Like a Tarahumara
Like a Tarahumara
Like an Indian
Like an Indian


Well even if they whistle you for a false start
Just keep going, don't look back
Just so long as your path has heart
The perfect runner leaves no track
After many, many hundreds of miles
I overtook myself at last
I made pretty good time overall
On my journey through the past


Like a Tarahumara
Like a Tarahumara
Like an Indian
Like an Indian
Like a spirit already long since finished
Before his race was even run
Like a Tarahumara
Lke a Tarahumara
Like an Indian
Like an Indian
Like a coyote in the shadow of the wilderness
At the setting of the sun
Like a runner . . . 
Like a runner . . .


Like a runner . . . fading away
Like a runner . . . fading away
Like a runner . . . fading away