In California

(album: Have One On Me - 2010)

My heart became a drunken runt
On the day I sunk in this shunt
To tap me clean of all the wonder
And the sorrow I have seen since I left my home

My home on the old Milk Lake
Where the darkness does fall so fast, it feels like some kind of mistake
Just like they told you it would
Just like the Tulgey Wood

When I came into my land
I did not understand
Neither dry rot or the burn pile
Or the bark-beetle or the dry well
Or the black bear

But there is another who is a little older
When I broke my bone, he carried me up from the riverside
To spend my life in spitting distance of the love that I have known
I must stay here, in an endless eventide

And if you come and see me, you will upset the order
You cannot come and see me, for I set myself apart
But when you come and see me in California
You cross the border of my heart

Well, I have sown untidy furrows across my soul, but I am still a coward
Content to see my garden grow so sweet and full of someone else's flowers
Sometimes, I can almost feel the power
Sometimes I am so in love with you
Like a little clock that trembles on the edge of the hour
Only ever calling out, "Cuckoo"

When I called you, you little one
In a bad way, did you love me? Do you spite me?
Time will tell if I can be well
And rise to meet you rightly

While moving across my land
Brandishing themselves like a burning branch
Advance the tallow-colored walleyed deer
Quiet as gondoliers

While I wait all night, for you in California
Watching the fox pick off my goldfish from their sorry golden state
And I am no longer afraid of anything
Save the life that here awaits

I don't belong to anyone, my heart is heavy as an oil drum
And I don't want to be alone, my heart is yellow as an ear of corn
And I have torn my soul apart from pulling artlessly with fool commands
Some nights, I just never go to sleep at all and I stand

Shaking in my doorway like a sentinel, all alone
Bracing like the bow upon a ship and fully abandoning
Any thought of anywhere but home, my home
Sometimes I can almost feel the power
And I do love you
Is it only timing that has made it such a dark hour?
Only ever chiming out, "Cuckoo"?

My heart, I wear you down, I know
Gotta think straight, keep a clean plate
Keep from wearing down
If I lose my head, just where am I going to lay it?

For it has half-ruined me to be hanging around
Here, among the daphne blooming out of the big brown
I am native to it, but I'm overgrown
I have choked my roots on the earth, as rich as roe
Here, down in California