Week Five - Tidal Pool

I write a lot of half-songs. I'm really good at writing a verse and a chorus, and then stalling out on the rest. My theory on why this happens is that in order to write good songs, I have to write from the subconscious mind. But once a song is underway, it gets pretty darn tough to ignore the fact that you're writing a song. Then the logical brain swoops around with its ideas, which are almost always formulaic and boring. Then I get disgusted with the whole process, throw up my hands, and file the half-song away, never to be seen again.

Well, almost never. Every once in a while, I go sifting through the compost heap, and pull out a pile of old song fragments to see what's there. And sometimes, once these fragments get shuffled around in my brain again, something sparks.

I wrote the refrain of this song years ago. I really have no idea when. I think it was attached to some other verses that are now on the cutting room floor. Then one day not too long ago, walking to the library from work, the line came to me "The sidewalks are poems, set in new time." I kept walking, kept writing, and when the time came for a refrain, the old fragment occurred and slipped right into place.

This song feels swimmy and spacey to me, so I really went for it on the underwater theme. I hope you enjoy it. And I hope that if you ever write songs yourself (or create anything, really) that you take the time once in a while to go digging through the compost heap. Sometimes it's worth it. 

Tidal Pool
The sidewalks are poems, set in new time
Punctuation and pavement, the cracks and the lines
The evenings are songs, set to new words
But the tune of your tiring, it always returns

You found me stuck in a windowsill
You painted your trails of golden light
Round anyone who might fit the bill
But always you whispering in the night.

Don't leave me alone: you are the kindest lover I've known

The boys in the hall are hyacinth blue
The glasses are clinking in the wallpapered room
The pain is a plague, and the whole town is full
Of infected subjected to the curse and the cure

There I lay drunk in a tidal pool
Your coral grew slowly around me
All of the others slipped out of view
With only your beauty surrounding

Don't leave me alone: you are the kindest lover I've known
I don't want to be free: if you're what's gonna kill me then kill me

If I travelled time, could you just stand still?
You could bask in my burnout in your atmosphere
The memories are stars transformed into stones
They weigh down my pockets and turn me to loam

---

That's it for now. But there'll be another new song next week. Sign up below and I'll send it straight to your inbox. Thanks for listening!