In A Market Dimly Lit

(album: Brother, Sister - 2006)

The bird that plucked the Olive Leaf
Has been circling like a record 'round the spindle of my mind
Where the needle's worn the grooves too deep,
And scratched the wax that's blistered from the heat besides.
From any movement in the room
If my cat walked by the arm skipped but to my surprise,
My interrupting cat improved
A sound already so severely compromised.

The needle's worn the grooves too deep.
The needle's worn the grooves too deep.
The needle's worn the grooves too deep.
The needle's worn the grooves too deep.

I'm a donkey's jaw on a desert dune
Beside the bush that Moses saw that burned and yet was not consumed!
She's the silver coin I lost! I'm the sheep who slipped away!
We pray the fingers crossed, but you listen patiently anyway.

I wrote a little song for you with a melody I'd borrowed put to
Words that didn't rhyme to repeat what you already knew,
As the stones thrown at your window tapped in syncopation.

You kept a distance out of fear you'd break,
But what good's a single wind chime hanging quiet all alone?
The music our collisions would make
Is the sound that turns "the road that leads us back home" into "home."

The music our collisions make!
The music our collisions make!
The music our collisions make!
The music our collisions make!

I had a rusty spade, but I'm not the fighting sort!
If I was Samson I'd have found that harlot's blade and cut my own hair short!
Then, in a market dimly lit, I'd come casually to pay:
"You see, my coins are counterfeit. Would you accept them anyway?"

So spare me your goodbyes, your waving-handkerchief goodbyes!
Given my tendency to err so on the sentimental side,
I will spare you my goodbyes.
The truth belongs to God! The mistakes were mine.