1. |
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Maybe we should find a house on the beach
Maybe we should move to Greece
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2. |
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A BETTER DAY HERE
The willow trees
Are staring at the dark grass
A perfume of lilac
Fills the evening
Children are playing
With undying smiles
The song will not be played
And neither will the book
Be done by the morning
No more heartaches
And no more pain
The days and nights
Will become one and the same
The flowers will be smelled
And the morning papers read
The song will not be played
And neither will the book
Be done by the morning
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3. |
Desolation Sound
04:51
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4. |
Discipline
04:08
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DISCIPLINE
Perhaps it is the pitchfork prodding the sodden earth,
though if it is, the connection remains somewhat elusive;
maybe the straightness of the handle,
or how deliberately the forget-me-nots have
entwined its prongs
But then again,
it is so hopelessly human,
this assigning intention—or even worse,
responsibility—to inanimate objects
It could, after all, only be me
and have little to do with external, discrete variables
(inclination of the growing grass, timing of the tides)
This sudden resolve
could be entirely my own
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5. |
January 1st, 1921
04:00
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JANUARY 1ST, 1921
(for Donald McMahon)
Sat down at the frozen window—
a little flat in Dublin
Just a lonely Irish boy,
all I can see is this snow
piled up on the ground
If I could leave this town
without her,
never turn around
until it’s over
The war left me so broken, tired and empty,
just waiting in this cold city
It’s New Year’s 1921
and this everlasting storm won’t come down
But then, your red dress on the floor
starts to look like a metaphor
for everything that goes wrong
when you try to belong
If I could leave this town
without her
and never turn around
until it’s over
The war left me so broken, tired and empty,
just waiting in this cold city
I could have been a true writer,
and told everyone about the little things
that still make a difference in this world
I could have been the last sailor
to stumble upon an island
no one’s ever found
and finally wear my crown
If I could leave this town
without you
and never turn around
like my life’s over
This love left me
both stranded and strangely free,
just dreaming of eternity
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6. |
Non Sequitur
00:59
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7. |
Ocean Song
03:31
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OCEAN SONG
A lost cabin, ramshackle grey
A broken down chimney
Our tiny mansion in the sun
What twisted, cruel destiny
After deserting your poor mother
The air thick with smother
We drifted for days
And how your body lays
And oh! my sweet, sweet bride
Sleeping here by my side
With dreams of unborn babies
And bright fields of poppies
This isn’t how it was to be
When we left our burning Normandy
But the Mistral pushed in
Before we’d cleared the country
So as I stand here, in my ragged skivvies
A lone semaphore with hands held high
I swear never again to leave this raft
The cover of the sheltering sky
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8. |
Waiting to Converge
05:00
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The story had to begin somewhere
A random bar, some party
But where would we be
If I hadn’t been there?
That night it seemed
No walls could contain our dreams
Forgetting how small we were
Pretending distances didn’t matter
Buses, ambulances will shake this town
Dogs will bark without a sound
Such an obvious coincidence
Yet suddenly everything makes sense
But what of everything that came before?
The waiting and hoping for more
Untethered, the months will align
Quickly this becomes a sign
Every climb contains its fall
This certainty rattling my bones
Now I guess I could call
But this life won’t fit into phones
What’s the feel of water
Without the smell of the sea?
We’re two ships lost in the harbor
And things won’t change, Marie
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9. |
This Farm Life
03:39
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THIS FARM LIFE
I grew tired of all of it,
the jostling, the isolation,
And in another version of the same story,
moved out to the country
But the sweetness
of this time of year
brings back long nights
walking the busy streets,
wanting it so bad I could taste it
I was but a child then,
all hope still intact,
in a brief reprieve
from the throttling force of motion
And now this farm life
has also lost its glitter
I want to feel the rumbling of Central Station,
to hear the drunkards spilling out onto the avenue
I want to forget the way the dogwood flowers
bend to meet the morning dew
And if the old doldrums
once more begin to taint the journey,
take me home again,
but don’t ever let me stay
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10. |
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ANOTHER NIGHT OF COLD BLANKETS
There is always a trigger,
a sound, a perfume,
a frame in time
Tonight, I am torn
between the graceful weightlessness
of your fingers
waltzing in the winter air
and the smooth curve
of your moving lips
This is another night
of cold blankets
and anemic traffic lights,
our dark overcoats,
like the prayer flags of Nepal,
flapping in the wind
We have lost track of words,
our voices just crossed in the night
like desperate cries for help
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11. |
Portland
05:04
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Portland
What I never told you:
I drove to Portland
because I missed you
(middle of summer,
the town empty)
Even Portland stifled me
It’s come down to this,
your name, a mantra,
a few snapshots—
variegated kites flying high in the stale July sky,
the mystical smell of pumpkin in your creaking staircase
They burned in Wenceslas Square,
walls dissolving into ether;
my mother, sixteen, a child of the century
And now we burn,
soaking in milk and honey
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12. |
Only September
04:51
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ONLY SEPTEMBER
So you’re sitting on a park bench,
pondering the imponderable
The evening is young
and you’re trying to picture time
as a patchwork of muted stills
And though you know home
is not only the shanty you call the same,
or the trellis through which you sift
every new stimulus,
you cling to the last shards
of the illusion of perspective,
hoping for the smallest of epiphanies,
for a shadow of illumination
Because, after all, it is you,
sitting on a park bench,
waiting patiently,
and it is only September
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13. |
A Long Dash
04:04
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A Long Dash
Wish I could remember more of it—this man, this mountain.
We came to it by foot
(as one does most important things),
up a steep, crumbling road,
shamed by two patient boys in sandals.
Lightness is just a state of mind, a grace that you will find.
For now you’re a muffled scream under a glass bell.
When everything starts falling apart, don’t go turning to art.
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Jake and the Leprechauns Sherbrooke, Québec
Jake and the Leprechauns are now known as Harvest Breed
www.harvestbreed.com
The Factory Session on Youtube: live versions of "When it breaks, it breaks", "Tangiers" and "Desolation Sound"
www.youtube.com/user/jakeleprechaun
... more
Jake and the Leprechauns recommends:
Everything Changes
by Harvest Breed
Debut record out April 2012!!
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