Names And Dates And Times

i know so many white people

i mean, where do i start?

the trouble with white people

is you can't tell them apart

i'm so bad with names and dates and times

but i'm big on faces

that is, except for mine



i believe you when you tell me

we've met before

this time you've got my interest

this time you've got the floor

why don't you go and tell me something

i don't already know

give me something to remember you by

when you go



i eat too much

i laugh too long

maybe i'll like too much of you

when i'm gone



let's go over to the window

and sit in the neon light

let's go out walking

you know, it's garbage night

let's go down to the east river

and throw something in

something we can't live without

and then let's start again



the more you talk

the more i get

the sense of something

that hasn't happened yet

the more you talk

the more i want to know

the way i'll remember you

when i go



i eat too much

i laugh too long

maybe i'll like too much of you

when i'm gone



i am so many white people

i mean where do i start

they've got lots of personalities

i just can't tell them apart

and i never remember anything

except for those things

which i never forget you know

there's no in between



i'm big on your face

yeah it's big in my mind

you're like the rest of the human race

you're one of a kind



Anyday

i will lean into you

and you can be the wind

i will open up my mouth

and you can come rushing in

you can rush in so hard

and make it so i can't breathe

i breathe too much anyway

i can do that anyday



i just wish i knew who you were

i wish you'd make yourself known

probably you don't know i'm her

the woman you want to call home

i'll keep my ear to the wall

i'll keep my eye on the door

'cause i've heard all my own jokes

and they're just not funny anymore

i laugh too much anyway

i can do that anyday



have you ever been bent or pulled

have you ever been played like strings

if i could see you i could strum you

i could break you

make you sing

but i guess you can't really see the wind

it just comes in and fills the space

and everytime something moves

you think that you have seen its face

and i've always got my guitar to play

but i can do that anyday



Forth Of July

you gotta have the right tools

for every job

so i invite myself in

through a hole in the fence

i am tripping through the junkyard

scanning over the piles

the thin cats raise their skin in defense

i know he's watching me

i can see him through the cracks

his eyes are small and shy on my back

he says his name is jason

he lives in the last trailer on the right

and he'll be seven

on the fourth of july



only the people who live here

know the name of this place

my path through iowa would be

hard to trace

all the adults in this town

try not to frown

when i walk by

but jason smiled at me

he met my eye



he don't ask me

where i'm from

or why i came

here alone

we all go looking for paradise

then we go back home

we cut out the small talk

go right to the way things are

he showed me his squirrel skull

i told him i locked myself out of my car



so there goes the only friend

i have in iowa

his hand flapping behind him

waving good-bye

his name is jason

he lives in the last trailer on the right

and he'll be seven

on the fourth of july



Willing To Fight

the windows of my soul

are made of one way glass

don't bother looking into my eyes

if there's something you want to know,

just ask

i got a dead bolt stroll

where i'm going is clear

i won't wait for you to wonder

i'll just tell you why i'm here



'cause i know the biggest crime

is just to throw up your hands

say

this has nothing to do with me

i just want to live as comfortably as i can

you got to look outside your eyes

you got to think outside your brain

you got to walk outside you life

to where the neighborhood changes



tell me who is your boogieman

that's who i will be

you don't have to like me for who i am

but we'll see what you're made of

by what you make of me

i think that it's absurd

that you think i

am the derelict daughter

i fight fire with words

words are hotter than flames

words are wetter than water



i got friends all over this country

i got friends in other countries too

i got friends i haven't met yet

i got friends i never knew

i got lovers whose eyes

i've only seen at a glance

i got strangers for great grandchildren

i got strangers for ancestors



i was a long time coming

i'll be a long time gone

you've got your whole life to do something

and that's not very long

so why don't you give me a call

when you're willing to fight

for what you think is real

for what you think is right



Egos Like Hairdos

i saw on the poster

my name was printed

just a little bit smaller

i can tell you need to stand

just a little bit taller

no one ever talks about it

but no one can disguise

the cloud of competition

that's hanging behind their eyes

there's more bad blood

in this bar than there is beer

and it's subtle but it still sucks

and i want out of here



we got egos like hairdos

they're different every day

depending on how we slept the night before

depending on the demons that are at our door



they told me you wanted to play last

every profession has its system of castes

so they reverse the order we go on

and then you stand at the bar

and you talk through my songs



we've got egos like hairdos

they're different every day

depending on how we slept the night before

depending on the demons that are at our door



everybody loves the underdog

but no one wants to be him

the press will fatten you up

and then they'll dig their teeth in

it's cool to discover someone

it's hard to support them

everyone is playing life

like it's some stupid sport



we got egos like hairdos

they're different every day

depending on how we slept the night before

depending on the demons that are at our door



i got my kitchen stocked

i got my door unlocked

there're no demons here

and i don't really care

whose name is printed in bigger type

you know i live in a world full of hope

not a world full of hype

i ain't no saint

i help myself to what i need

but i help other people too

y'know i sleep soundly



Back Around

my lipstick

jumped ship

to a styrofoam cup

with the coffee gone

the conversation strong

all i got left to give

baby, is up

but sentiments like shadows grow

oh so long



guess i gotta go

don't get up

don't cry

it's really very simple

just kiss my cheek and say goodbye

i never really go anywhere anyway

i just pass through from time to time



bye bye baby

baby bye bye

maybe i'll see you

next time i'm in town

maybe when i'm through

falling off the face of the earth

i'll come back around

you know i love to come back around



ten hours of driving

will make your mind

kind of numb

but it's better than

ten dollars an hour

slamming a hammer on my thumb

and it's better than

five dollars an hour

selling people shit

i wouldn't buy myself

at least at the end of the day

i'm always somewhere else



bye bye baby

baby bye bye

maybe i'll see you

next time i'm in town

maybe when i'm through

falling off the face of the earth

i'll come back around

you know i love to come back around



Blood In The Boardroom

sitting in the boardroom

the i'm-so-bored room

listening to the suits

talk about their world

they can make straight lines

out of almost anything

except for the line

of my upper lip when it curls

dressed in my best greasy skin

and squinty eyes

i'm the only part of summer here

that made it inside

in the air-conditioned building

decorated with corporate flair

i wonder

can these boys smell me bleeding

though my underwear



there's men wearing the blood

of the women they love

there's white wearing the blood of the brown

but every woman learns to bleed from the womb

and we bleed to renew life

every time it's cut down

i got my vertebrae all stacked up

as high as they go

i but i still feel myself sliding

from the earth that i know

so i excuse myself and leave the room

say my period came early

but it's not a minute too soon



i go and find the only other woman on the floor

is the secretary sitting at the desk by the door

i ask her if she's got a tampon i could use

she says

oh honey, what a hassle for you

sure i do

you know i do

i say

it ain't no hassle, no, it ain't no mess

right now it's the only power

that i possess

these businessmen got the money

they got the instruments of death

but i can make life

i can make breath

sitting in the boardroom

the i'm-so-bored room

listening to the suits talk about their world

i didn't really have much to say

the whole time i was there

so i just left a big brown bloodstain

on their white chair



Born A Lion

i'm not hurting anyone

i'm just telling my truth

and if there

if there is something wrong

then maybe

there's something wrong with you

what's the big deal

get over it

relax

just 'cause i do up in your face

what other people do behind your back

why we all gotta look

gotta act the same

i say

if you're born a lion

don't bother trying to act tame

everything i do

i do for the first time

i got a big crush on you

and it's crushing my mind

can i follow you home

and listen to you think

leave my lip prints on your cups

leave my hairs in your sink

they think i'm out there

out there living on the fringe

well

this is my world

and i invited them in

they should try living

by my rules for a day

nobody would die

there'd be lots of stuff to say

i'm not hurting anyone

no i'm not hurting anyone



My I.Q.

when i was four years old

they tried to test my i.q.

they showed me a picture

of 3 oranges and a pear

they said,

which one is different?

it does not belong

they taught me different is wrong

but when i was 13 years old

i woke up one morning

thighs covered in blood

like a war

like a warning

that i live in a breakable takeable body

an ever increasingly valuable body

that a woman had come in the night to replace me

deface me

see,

my body is borrowed

yeah, i got it on loan

for the time in between my mom and some maggots

i don't need anyone to hold me

i can hold my own

i got highways for stretchmarks

see where i've grown

i sing sometimes

like my life is at stake

'cause you're only as loud

as the noises you make

i'm learning to laugh as hard

as i can listen

'cause silence

is violence

in women and poor people

if more people were screaming then i could relax

but a good brain ain't diddley

if you don't have the facts

we live in a breakable takeable world

an ever available possible world

and we can make music

like we can make do

genius is in a back beat

backseat to nothing if you're dancing

especially something stupid

like i.q.

for every lie i unlearn

i learn something new

i sing sometimes for the war that i fight

'cause every tool is a weapon -

if you hold it right.



Used To You

i'm still here because

i've got nothing else to do

you're an asshole

but i'm getting used to you

i like the fact that

you talk incessantly

i got a thing for assholes

who tell good stories



i think that drinking

is the only thing that you do right

you're gonna self-destruct

i think that's what i like

you like me so you try and make me

feel like shit

i think it's kind of funny yeah

i kind of enjoy it



if you're gonna do it, overdo it

that's how you know you're alive

go ahead, take yourself a coma nap

take a puddle dive



you said, this is my bedroom window

you said, this is my view

you said, lie down here with me

and see the things that i do

like you were trying to tell me something

about the way you live

like you would give me something

if you had something to give



and for all your talk

you don't say much that's real

i think i know more than you

about the way that you feel

i understand your anger

and your apathy

i think if i was you,

you're who i'd be



i'm still here

'cause i got nothing else to do

you're an asshole but

i'm getting used to you

i could love you, yeah

i've entertained the thought

but i could never like you

so i guess i'd better not



Pick Yer Nose

how come i can pick my ears

but not my nose

who made up that rule anyway

how can you say that's the way it is

that's just the way it goes

why don't you decide for yourself

what you can do

and what you can say



how come i can pick my friends

but not my enemies

what is it about me that offends

what is it about me

'cause you know i'm only five foot two

and i'm giggly wiggly

tell me again, what did i do

why are you scared of me

i fight with love

and i laugh with rage

you've gotta live light enough

to see the humor

and long enough to see some change



i think shy is boring

i think depressed is too

i think pretty is nice

but i'd rather see something new

all these plastic people

got their plastic surgery

but we got a big big beautiful

we got it for free

who you gonna be

if you can't be yourself

you can't get it from t.v.

you can't force it on

anybody else



you know they come to clear cut

they come to strip mine

they come for some of my big butt

my big brain

or just a little time

they wanna take me out to dinner

think i'm a bitch if i don't go

seems like the people who actually like me

won't allow me to say no

your idea of a conversation

is the third degree

but i don't really know you

and i don't really want to talk about me



'cause i'm not going to pretend

that i don't pick my nose

that's just the way it is, my friends

that's just the way it goes

this is who i am

what i do

and what i say

if you like it, let it be

if you don't, please do the same

i fight with love

i laugh with rage

you gotta live light enough to see the humor

and long enough to see some change



God's Country

state trooper thinks i drive too fast

pulled me over to tell me so

i say out here on the prairie

any speed is too slow

i miss brooklyn i miss my crew

let's start over

i missed my cue

guess i just forgot

who i was talking to



i should have recognized

that fierce look in his eyes

i've seen it in the mirror

so many times

he's going to put his two cents in

'cause he's got a gun

but i'm gonna put in three

'cause history owes me one



guess i came out here to see some

stuff for myself

i mean, why leave the telling

up to everybody else

this may be god's country

but it's my country too

move over mr. holiness

and let the little people through



thank you for serving and protecting

the likes of me

thank you for the ticket

now can i leave?

you know i have left everywhere

i have ever been

i don't really recommend it

though not like anyone asked me

maybe you and i

will meet again someday

i've been known to

come down this road

call it destiny

and then again

maybe not

i don't know