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VALERY GORE - Avalanche To Wandering Bear - 2008
VALERY GORE - Self-Titled - 2005
Shoes of Glass top
When you’re gone, it’s a thirst so dire
Water for the heart, to put out the fire
Needle on the record, static in the word
Rhythm for a feeling left to feel absurd
Rocky mountain path, goodbye, goodbye
When you walk away, shoes of glass
Empty in a room, cornered between two highways
Transport after transport, a pillow for where I lie
Night brings a song, canyon in a monochrome
I borrow the chord from the bird that flies home
Rocky mountain path, goodbye, goodbye
When you walk away, shoes of glass
And I still hear you say, goodbye, goodbye
Another Year top
The time has come, another year
Sit around the table
And a dark cloud like eye shadow on your face
It seems to me it’s gotten worse
The lines that held - the stitches break
The hole that found a place in your heart
Has found a place once more
I sometimes go to the other side
I kick the can across the road
Be it blood or bones or love, it’s my burden and I carry it
How will you know how much I love
When you only look halfway up
And you wring your hands like it’s all flowing out
Of the tips, but it never is
The time has come, another year
Worried Head top
When I’m up that’s when it hits me down
But my cold blood and rusty heart
Continue with will for only you
Bitter and true, for you
Pouring rain, I’m out on the sprouted grass
Moving tense and drenched like some animal
Born into this world with no camouflage
So dance your bare bones
Cause when it’s time to take the stage
You better be ready to rage
Without that beautifully worried head
There’d just be a bleeding neck
A boneless back, a creeping ghost and heart attack
Without a worried head
Hand moves and card tricks and good reflex
Save me from the party’s domino effect
I’ll be in the next room practicing
Glamorous routines
Cause when it’s time to take the stage
You better be ready to rage
Scared top
This is scared
The teeth and the air
Like a cliff to the sky
They shudder there
This is scared
Doubt like a fringe
Around my dress
It gathers there
This is scared
A bird that hit
The kitchen pane
The world was framed
Avalanche
To a wandering bear
I try to watch
The berometer
But underneath
This thick coat I wear
This is scared
Great Lakes top
All of my bearings of copper and steel post to each day
By way of the moon
And the rust of the dangle are the stars that you see
The stars that you point out when you are not with me
Furthest most radial non-breaking point, I am destitute
Waiting as the sun burns on
I’m caught in a foot trap of steel and copper
I see the Great Lakes on a silver spoon
I am collar high and hamper-less, clothes layered on skin
That’s cracking and breaking when light is seemingly dim
I’ll wave a red flag on the day of your birth and feel the worth
Of silence in moments when I think of you, dear
I’m caught in a foot trap of steel and copper
I see the Great Lakes on a silver spoon
Angora top
angora
wrists itch
things of early year
dissolve in the wind
it’s what you wanted
feathers in your hair
it’s what you wanted
and it won’t come
mellodrama
days end
things that remind you
pick up and turn over cars
it’s what we wanted
to tell our story
it’s what we wanted
and it won’t come
linted, neck thick
things of static
show up in the light
it’s what you wanted
to show the world
it’s what you wanted
and it won’t come
Knife Dream top
I cut you there, on a bunk bed, legs dangling
Long dark hair, no information you could tolerate
Crimson in the kidneys and blue walls in your eyes
And it sunk in as the hour hit
You folded like a dress
From here on in you’re a heroine, tucked in
And you’ll be forgiving in your sleep, forgiving me
You folded like a dress
The end
Shot On Film top
Shot on film, eyes wide open
And the O of your mouth, oh
Burned out, turned inside out
Burned out, turned inside out
Capture this one’s profile
In your Smashing Pumpkins t-shirt
I wrote it on that wall
Too small and out of focus
Shot in dark, shutter wide open
And the O of your hands folded, so
Burned out, turn right round
Burned out, turned right side out
Capture this one’s profile
In your Smashing Pumpkins t-shirt
I wrote it on that wall
Too small and out of focus
In the replay of it
I can feel youth again
Shot on film, eyes wide open
Cartwheels and cat calls, oh
Drowned out, turned inside out
Drowned out, not a sound
Capture this one’s profile
In your Smashing Pumpkins t-shirt
I wrote it on that wall
Too small and out of focus
Red Eye Family top
Em futzes with the lawn mower
Ron sticks his fingers in every lemonade stand he can find
It creates an orange colour among the faces of girls that line Morrison Avenue
What’s a boy to do?
What you can’t have leaves with the a.m. trash collection
I am up and down the house all night, these feet weighed by the luggage of his leaving
I stuff deeply all my dirty laundry into the carry bag that Cliff left when he gave his smile to the war
My mother loved all those sweaters because they complimented his eyes
She’d watch me walk into a room wearing my green sweater and all she would see were
The blue eyes of Cliff
A twitch through the shoulders
For you, I hold a secret between the grind of these teeth
It breaks you until all I see is an awful wife that strokes your fleshy heart with a kitchen knife
I’m sorry dear, I didn’t mean to hurt you
How many single roses, radio singles, pairs of stockings?
I’m running the red light right out of these eyes
I’m taping up all my banners for this homecoming
I’m your home fries, Betty Davis, squad of cheer, and a malt milkshake
Still no one told me that eyes die
Take care of that recipe cause it’s been in the family for years
Black Creek top
It takes a long time to catch up with you
Days fly by with the trains going west and east from the city
It’s nothing new, but all the blinders are coming down on this night and I
Can’t find you
That used to sit through tea and weed the garden, stay up until eleven
Drive the red car between the green leaved trees in the middle of the summer
Middle of the summer
I’ll get on my knees and dig the worms out, grow a plant there so years later
Every day, I’ll be there
It takes a long time to grow these arms so they can stretch and warm what they’ve got
Right in front of them and to the side
It takes a long time
They move the blinders on this night still I can’t find you
That stitched the straightest lines of thread
I found the blush and rouge
Your face lit up
1972
I am one for these pictures
One for these pictures
I’ll get on my knees and dig the worms out, plant the lips and teeth of smiles so light of those there does not burn out inside of you
I see you like I see myself some day-stubborn and selfless, giving away
The kitchen table, giving away the bed
Giving up on the long road that ends
And you’re running through the field, toward the light on the porch
And you sit down at the table and grace welcomes you
Consolation top
If I lost my one real thing
I don’t know who I’d be kissing
But I could never
Imagine the taste of consolation
If I lost my way in here
Topsy turvy on a barstool
I could never
Imagine the taste of consolation
I like making jokes at my expense
Repressed one-sided arguments
Dear, you know how I can get
When milk’s gone sour and there’s
Stale air in the bread
I could never
Imagine the taste of consolation
Sparrow top
I always thought the word sparrow was so much like the word sorrow.
I will remember them-still, unmoving, waiting for your car.
Boston, Massachusetts. You belong to another time now, and I understand why.
It’s like kicking a paper-thin wall that eventually gives in if you put a lot of leg into it.
Strange Way top
It’s decided, like two life sentences for the con
That love is not love until youth is gone
Take sixty percent success and minus the forty that failed
You got me on a ten-year list with baby and the fun kill
It’s a strange way to talk about it
Take my hand and make a dull moment for me
To know I am only at the mercy of elastic band minutes and vanilla flavoured routine
I’d be the axe thrower with one good arm and a long list of casualties
Before you’d step up with your heart aflame, trustingly
It’s a strange way to talk about it
When it’s not about the money, then the poor are just fools
It’s not waiting for the world but waiting for dinner’s food
Swiftly or slowly, to throw yourself into the bottomless gaping underneath it
Is all the same while wearing your official jumping clothes with the buckles and clips and security codes
It’s a strange way to talk about it all
Augustine top
Augustine,
What a formidable time warp. I am 1926 all over again. Sprawled out along the dandelion fields and red coppery tracks to the wrecking yard.
You say these knees grow weak. I am a harbour begging boats beneath you, a trembling bridge. For a change you sail the sea.
What if it really was the coast with the most? Will these cigarette ashes leave a trail to a side-walk’s end? To a lock of grey hair? Will it lead me there?
You are my 1952, my Harley or Cadillac days. You ride with the wind. You are a water pump in the back well, rusting. You rust to my hands.
Days when I thought I gave too much now pounce on a penny for it’s worth. Augustine, florentine. Order it from the menu when the bell man takes your coat. What a fine coat it is. You go at the break of dawn and when you go you break everyone’s little splendid heart.
And you’re remembered.
CBC top
We bring you the latest news
from coast to coast.
Some times when you drop
off this earth, I don’t know quite
where to
tune my aerial
Transmission capsized
Your eyes, not the light in the
lighthouse
We bring you the latest news
from coast to coast.
Dancing top
My heart went out to Jeffrey. It bled dry in it’s returning.
Through the years all I’ve known is the knowing that this heart is only my own.
The sound of it came crashing, but so silent to your musical ears.
No, you’ll never the know the difference between you and the rest until the
safety of all the years.
We’d be grey and old. I would knit you sweaters in the cold.
And we’d be just like my Grandparents when they go dancing
When you left that evening sober, the rain poured down on my dry feet.
So long to the city lights and hello to the country’s slow breeze.
As is part of the landscape. And as the palm of the hand-there are some features
which claim so local to this feeling inside my body.
Time. Time. Time will change. All else just stays the same.
With your flame and your wooden stick, I’m a rambler to meet you half way.
And if I could only see that day you were mine, I would take this chance,
this blessing and be the only thing I know to be
Delorla top
Delorla,
I feel so bombarded by this twisted rage.
No one’s to say what I’ll do, but
I will lead you around the kitchen floor behind
our home’s closed doors. Toes are fragile and we
try to step around the cracks in my mind.
Rattle snakes. It’s very bold, but I don’t think
you should go alone. Take me with you off to
my inner catastrophe.
The tide won’t bite, but you never know.
Sure may try to tip your boat.
I catch the rain with the only quench I will ever know.
Through morning soft light I’ll keep it
in my heart- you painting the world with your red dress.
Kiss me, Delorla, stretch your arms around me.
Neglect the world like some American president.
You break it all with the slight of a hand.
You break it all with the weight of your
passion, your
red lips, your
dance steps and
smooth hips.
I’m a lucky man. Your
calm words and
laughter
and the space between your front teeth,
the way you say I am not cruel to you.
Thank you. Thank you.
This life, so full of regret.
It suffers you until you’re only what
you dream, not what you say out loud.
You’re screaming through the front door.
I hear the cause in the trembling, my love,
only in an empty house.
Dance our favourite song, on the player piano.
Toes were fragile and we tried to step around
the cracks in my mind
Kiss me, Delorla.
Your hands moved like water.
I’m a lucky man.
I’m a lucky man.
Elliott Goes top
So, we’ll play it out like
young children in beat up
Wranglers jeans,
taping mohawks to the heads of
G.I. Joes and
screaming out for our
All American Hero.
What you can’t hear, nobody knows.
So Elliott Goes.
I will wish you a ring of gold,
a cloak of white.
I will wish you a Solemn Sunday.
I will blow you a kiss from the
south wind.
Your hands tied by the weight of it.
What you can’t catch, you cannot hold.
So Elliott Goes.
I like living by this lake.
The breeze carries in all the sadness.
The tears of a thousand dead sailors
hit the ground with the rain.
Elliott, what a shame that
your hands are freed by the weight of it.
What you can catch you certainly can hold.
So Elliott Goes.
A Leaving Car top
always a fine one grabbing
the hand gun
I have fifteen channels on the
am dial
back seat’s full of flyer mail
there is no room
no room for anyone
break of dawn and i’m driving
driving solemn one
understand it’s not about you
there’s one thing true
these socks are green
the grass seems blue
fishing boats were gonna bring me home
bring me home to you
some say i’ve changed
still as all the days when her and i
would play field tag
i go around
i come back down through the
tunnel of time where i can see
over and over
it’s not about you
there’s one thing true
these socks are green
the grass seems blue
fishing boats were going to bring me home
bring me home to you
Song For Six top
So rosy, all my cheeks so rosy
I feel like the spoiled girl who ruins all
your birthday parties
The winner of musical chairs
You take and take and take and I notice
every time the music stops we
hold our breaths
for you
I am all alert and waiting, six am
is fading
Wake and I’ll be gone again
until winter bites the cork
Empties pile on back shelves
like penicillin bottles collected over a
ten year disease
for you
Betting you wish you could walk through walls
hitting elbows off the corners of the walls
that separate the room that I sit in and the
room where you lay your head down
I am not a friend
I am not anyone
I’m just another person waiting in line for you
to change
When will the time come?
Six am is fading wake and I’ll be gone again
It tears me up inside.
(You are not forgiven.)
Untitled top
These days I go insane. Down on my knees,
don’t you know you’re the one to blame
When all my intentions begin to frame an
everlasting pause on the soul of my gain
Whether or not this fall breeze begins it’s way,
the music on the pier of goodbye makes me sway
The mind is a wonder, your mind can’t betray
something so real has to fight the decay
Night time
Day rise
I am gone
Sad to say
You walk like something that’s leaving
Your shoes caress the cold
Your mouth hung wide open like there’s a
song about to unfold
You wear a smile like it’s a painter’s smock
Words too messy when spoke
I don’t care that you’re leaving babe, just let me know
which evening gown to wear for my
night time
Day rise
I’m gone
Sad to say
42 miles, I don’t think I know where else to find it
but just look at what the sunset does to your eyes
Since last September I’ve been yellow like the falling leaves
under your precious feet
I’ve been begging summer
Roads to you, where are the yellow lines to keep me inside
Trains lose their tracks and I can’t deny what goes around
just loses it’s way
There was a loss of breath which would come as no surprise
‘Twas not the bitter cold wind from the lake or the white
caps
washing up in your eyes
I beat it down with my self defense
A harm in the arms of a sweet sense
Days turn to weeks and I’m still standing here waiting for
one more
night time
day rise
I’m gone
sad to say
42 miles, I can’t find you
And the sun has gone down
Since that last time we met I’ve been yellow like you
cannot forget
Oddly appeased but yet, I’ve been begging summer
Roads to you, where are the yellow lines to keep me inside
Trains lose their tracks and I can’t deny what goes around
just loses it’s way
Waded top
Waded down by the water underneath the sound
Waited for the night to steal away the waves
Waited for the darkness, you were never one to beg
Your shoes are so soaked
I don’t care anymore
Tired eyes glow
Take me to where I know
Through your eyes, there’s no soul
My sail is a sail made of melody and twine
Wisdom be mine, fortune to find
Take my love dear, take it all but you
can’t steal my pride
Part of your ancestry, I’ll be the outcast family
Tired eyes glow
Take me to where I know
Through your eyes, there’s no soul
White Pills top
He takes pills, five of them a day
Goes to work with a happy face
See Joan, dancing in the aisles all green
Oh that girl, so obscene and
tick-tock, in his mind just never stops
“What do you want
what do you want
You can take it all!”
In one way I don’t blame him, love is
bound to drain inside having the
best girl of the universe
by your side
With the way the world is, I don’t know
what he’ll do
Might go nuts and then blame it on the politics
All the nightmares he’s had of white pills
chasing him round and round
What is burying you into the ground
Don’t cry. I’ll ease your mind.
You are my gift. Don’t you know.
The world is on fire.
His glory girl so full of life
He better know her future should be bright
Dark eyes, the kind that make you hypnotised
From far away you won’t lose her
She took photographs of her fate
and watched the pupils dilate
Don’t cry. I’ll ease your mind.
You are my gift. Don’t you know.
The world is on fire.
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