1. |
Your Side
04:04
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I’ve got a craving, I’m waiting to fly
Sail around the blue whales bloating up the sky
What do I want, what do I want more than my pride?
Take me over, bring me over to your side
Take me over, bring me over to your side
Cross my attention, silver and wide
Moonbeams capture those who want to ride
Nothing I want, nothing I want makes me satisfied
So take me over, bring me over to your side
Take me over, bring me over to your side
Where did the mountains go?
There with my body below.
How do the starlings know
Where to find our bodies below?
Candied violets and lopsided deals
I dance til the morning licks the blood off my heels
Five stones blessed and a crow for my guide:
Take me over, bring me over to your side.
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2. |
Make Me Feel Alright
02:49
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Curl your fingertips
To the hollow of my hips
Steady bracing into you
The flutter of your lips
Could sink relationships
Cadavers floating blue
But can you make me feel alright?
Can you make me feel a new
Kind of sickly sweat to break into?
Can you make me feel a
Tripping on pavement, eyes on a brick
The mirror makes me sick
I cut my mouth in two
Screaming into the wind
Drying out my skin
Too tired to get to the glue
But can you make me feel alright?
Can you make me feel a new
Kind of selfishness to slip into?
Can you make me feel a
I am the mountains to navigate
I am the compass to calibrate
I will bring candles to luminate
But I’m too on fire to concentrate
Can you make me feel alright?
Can you make me feel that tried and true
Kind of selfishness to creep into?
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3. |
A Seed
02:54
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I am a seed
But I treat me like a leaf
Floating on the breeze
Restless, dead and free
I take no space
‘Cause I think I lost my place
And the honeysuckle taste
Of my sisters
So I pray for the wind and rain
To carry me back from which I came
A strange pang strains my stomach
Wild, I try to love it
A crash and a groan
I am not what I have known
Tender in the loam
Queen where I am thrown
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4. |
A Present
05:15
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You are crawling
Away from the coal dust
Coughing up rowboats,
Saddles and roses
You can't cry, can't laugh 'cause your room is wired
You can't close your lids even when you're tired
You can't breathe 'cause the corset's laced too tight
But look, there's a jungle and a swing
That your best friend made from nails and string
And I made you a present
A library and a place to sing
They were watching.
They were instructed,
"I dare you, I dare you
to lay a finger."
He closed and she opened up too wide
And he ran the halls with the red inside
And you held your tongue so you could devise a divide
But look, there's a jungle and a swing
That your best friend made from nails and string
And I made you a present
A redwood tree and a perfect spring
Hospice attendant
Charging the bolus
"I'm not ready, I'm not ready!"
You were infected.
They pinned you in a body cast
Even though the tornado was coming fast
Pumped you with morphine so you wouldn't talk
But I'm not gonna be quiet, I'm gonna tell the whole block!
And while the siren's are blaring, I'll cut the wires
Unplug the drips that made you tired
Evacuate you and hold you tight
And you can't come down 'cause you can't calm down
But you caught that glimpse: we will be your ground.
We will be there when you can look again.
A nylon rug
A labored bed, and a loaded gun.
They made you unhappy, but now it's done
Oh, now it's done
So look, there's a jungle and a swing
That your best friend made from nails and string
And I made you a present
A library and a space to sing
So look, there's your family
And all your friends and your bunnies
And I made you a present,
A redwood tree and a perfect spring
And they made you unhappy,
Made you believe you couldn't breathe
But I made you a present:
I'll let it be a memory.
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5. |
Split Generation
04:45
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Split cheek
Split bone
Split generation
Dry lip
Covert
Hidden and passed over
My own hands are bloody
Sitting by the telly
Rooted like an oak tree
Stripped of its bark
Crowded in a bunker
Freed by the people
Who lined us by the river
And shot in the dark
Oceans
Apart
Embroidered in the heart
A word
A chart
Our lines let us depart
A star feeding on its own tail
Thank G-d we already set sail
A star feeding on its own tail
Thank G-d
My own hands are bloody
Sitting by the telly
Rooted like an oak tree
Stripped of its bark
Crowded in a bunker
Freed by the people
Who lined us by the river
And shot in the dark
If you can’t see what I could be
Then you can’t take what I’ve got
If I can’t waken the oak tree
Then who will I be in the dark?
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6. |
Mourning Language
05:03
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Which language should I mourn in for you?
Which colors should I wear
On the day we take your name
Out of address books
And into a Yahrzeit prayer
Your sisters wouldn’t understand?
Your brother, your daughter, your wife
Your promise, your duty, your roof
Your shoulders too heavy with life
Your candle too hollow with truth.
Hills of flesh eroded by the gullies of despair
Trickling in Cadillacs proportioned to receding hair
Which language should I mourn in?
What colors should I wear
On the day we add your name
To the Yahrzeit prayer?
Sealing up the window cracks and hoarding all the air
Rocking like a passenger on unmarked roads needing repair
Cross the bridge and we begin the holy unprepared
On the day we add your name
To the Yahrzeit prayer.
Your brother, your daughter, your wife
Your promise, your duty, your roof
Your shoulders too heavy with life
Your candle too hollow with truth.
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7. |
The Climb
07:24
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The atmosphere is impaled
On a hundred rising spires
Feet are slipping on sweaty backs
To reach our future stars
Chrome ferns uncurling
Cranes extend like cracks in ice
From the weight of an impatient skater
From the weight of an unfinished plate
From the weight on me
Marble faces gaze
Down the coterie of G-d
Fires burst in the blink of
An alabaster eye
The parachute is circling
Keeps our creeping safe from rain
From the weight of nauseous lakes
From the weight of stratospheric slate
From the weight on me
Lurching and grasping at ankles and thread
I’m blooming and shaking as I labor to shed
All this weight on me
The atmosphere is impaled
On a thousand struggling spires
Thighs are gripping on mangled jaws
To reach the next rung
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8. |
To Glow
05:55
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Waves crashing
Toppling the first skyscraper
You lift a finger
Just a finger
Though I wear
Your rival's name
On my jacket pocket
I knock on every splinter
At the time
I was back of line
For the silver shrine
Now I'm sitting prime
On a piece of dime
That we used to climb
Let all the bastards know
What we'll burn to glow
Packed like sailors
Swap sweat and skittles
I always won at playing dead
Back in time
I was back of line
For the backer's kind
Caught the record's shine
Now I'm shitting dimes
For a light of lime
And I'm
Losing my breath to show
What we'll burn to glow
Circle the melting snow
And all that we'll burn to glow
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Starlings Somerville, Massachusetts
Starlings are a three piece theatrical rock band. Former The Sinister Turns members Susan Putnins + Dan Thorn join with Benjamin Bakman to bring dynamics, quirk, heart and heaviness to their music.
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