This is my day for waiting on the phone I've been waiting here so long That the song on the radio's repeating, yeah and This is my day to get a flat tire And get stuck out on the highway all alone Just ten miles shy of meeting you, and Hold out my hands to the midmorning rain There's a woman crying in a town somewhere to the east Don't ask me how I can hear it through all this thunder Sometimes something hits your wavelength and it finds its way all the way to my ears I don't know what I did wrong Seems I always wreck the song Trying to squeeze too many words into too little space If I had a year or two To escape from all of these crazy cars and trains I might understand your love again, and Hold out my hands to the midmorning rain How it's falling like the pieces of a puzzle made of glass And they dissolve into a picture in my hands Reflections of the sky mingle with my life line again (Bridge) And I don't know if this is The place I broke down last year I'd like to think I got a little farther this time But I always seem to break down I try to find a rusted souvenir An ornate turning gear I give it to you This is my day to find your note In the pocket of my coat That you wrote a year ago I never saw it Telling me I should not fret and that everything it happens for the best As long as you can see the sky, and Hold out your hands to the midmorning rain Cup a bit of everything in life there in your hands People on the highway rushing by so fast Would wish that they were broken down If they knew the pleasure you get from the rain

Well, we’re heading over the Brooklyn Bridge now Our engine sputters and comes to a halt And the cars around us clench their wheels in anger Against the sparkling asphalt You say, “You should have filled the tank up back in Jersey!” I say, “I would have but the gas gage doesn’t work!” Now the cars are backed up for miles and miles As we get a ticket from an NYPD parking clerk Chorus: Lisa, I'm sorry I brought you to New York City I'm sorry you're having a bad time The buildings strech so high And the skyline's so pretty Maybe you'd have a better time of it If you could just stop complaining Well, our friends we’re staying with they just got married After three days with us they’re threatening divorce They offered us free tickets to see the Sox play the Yankees But you told them, “We don’t like sports!” I was scared half to death at the Life Café There was a Pit Bull in the vestibule by the door He was chewing on the remains of a bacon double cheeseburger And he looked like he wanted something more Chorus We headed south to a restaurant by the river Our waitress danced with candles on her head She tripped on your bag And the highlights of your hair turned a brilliant fiery red You sprinted all the way out to the front door Were you crying out in anger or in pain? You stepped outside And your hair was extinguished By the sweet summer rain Lisa, I'm sorry I brought you to New York City I'm sorry you're having a bad time The buildings strech so high And the skyline's so pretty Maybe you'd have a better time of it If it would just stop raining

Drivin’ down on the highway Feel the wind on my neck Came in this town on a one night stand And I ain’t ever coming back You couldn’t see things my way You don’t like my point of view But maybe baby I was to blame Tryin’ to find someone else inside you Chorus: Still hear the Pacific shores call from far away Saying maybe she will come back Back to me someday Her daddy, he was a sailor Followed the Northern Star Ended up in jail for fifteen years For what started out as a fight in a downtown bar And she tends to laugh when she’s nervous And she cries when she’s tired The way she always finds her way is something That I have always admired Chorus (Bridge) Night time, falling down the dunes of Half Moon Bay Our footprints glowed in the phosphorescent sand And I left my guitar too close to the shore And when the tide came in, it played a lonesome tune So, I snatched it up and played you a song I hadn’t even written yet And if I remember correctly it went a little something like this Drivin’ down on Highway 1, I feel your hand on my lap The air is warm, your eyes are closed And you’re taking an afternoon nap And I wrote you a letter, sayin’, “Hey I’m doing fine.” You wrote me back, said you never took me to be The phone talking letter writing kind. Chorus

How can I know What is it you're thinking If you won't tell me yourself? I try to read signs You leave with your fingers Still the dust collects upon my shelf The car backfired and sounded like a whole parade of gunshots Your speckled dog was cowering, and the butterflies flew off And I had no more hurry, I just gave my breath to chance then Left a dusty city phantom for a green I had supposed Out on the road Past all the truckstops I couldn't drive anymore You said there's a sound something strange in the engine We stopped for you to try to find a cure I took your dog and ran Out towards the mountains We found a sandy place there Where a bluebird had flown past And when I came on back You'd got the engine running You took that tattered feather And laid it on the dash Chorus: Fractured words and scattered moments We felt each other move at night You touched my hair just like a comet Sparkling shivers of your light Tousle-haired child From over the mountains From a planet far, far away Stay with me long I believe in the silence You will find a way to say, "I love you like a night Sky that comes a-searching Over hills and canyons For a poet to inspire And through the dark green night I'll find the place that's hurting And with the sand inside me To heal it I will try"

I was conquered by your kiss, overthrown by your beauty, Babe, When Jed came in for the hostile takeover Yeah, he came in so valiantly on his Trojan Horse I think it was around the same time that we used our last pack Now I sit here amidst the rubble of empty beer cans and pizza boxes But I’m rebuilding Rome in a day I think about you in my sleep My head grows heavy and my knees get we-e-eak Chorus: Wherever you go, I will be with you A-A-A-Always Wherever you go, I will be with you In your memory You and Jed finally left that shed You’ve got a one room apartment with weeds in the lawn Yeah, we used to talk about having babies together A girl named Jasmine, a boy named Leo or Zack Yeah, Jasmine was gonna be an Astrophysicist And Leo, a writer of songs Yeah, we’d look on so proud on graduation day, babe, When Jasmine gave the Valedictorian Address Your ghost comes back at three past noon You might have left this place too so-o-oon Chorus I’m pied piper to the rats in my practice space Where I practice all I do and say And I relive my past, and I realize my dreams And it’s the place; you all know the place, Where we all get a little better or a little worse each day There’s Sleepy- he keeps me up all night with his snoring And Grumpy cheers me up when I get real angry Sister Heartache looks at me with her halo smile She says, “It’s only a matter of time.” And Grumpy says, “Hey man, get over it, She’s a real pain in the ass and you can do much better!” Sister Heartache cries, “You may never find a love as good as this one, Man, there’s not even a reason to try.” I think about you all the time I try to come up with words that rhy-y-yme Chorus

So they say, It was the coldest winter here in fifteen years Winds so cold they even froze your tears Ain't it strange, my love? Then it took Pouring like a fire through the burning rain Stepping off the platform of that midnight train That shook our ice castle walls Picture still sits on the window sill Where we lay frozen in a kiss Here on Winter Hill There you were I was frozen by my worries, sitting at the bar When you broke the ice and picked at your guitar And drank from my frozen cup That's when it changed I was melting like a snowman when the air gets warm Ain't it funny how our passion takes a different form Say, ain't it strange my love? Boarded your ship and you took the till And we sailed home that night to our place on Winter Hill Well, spring time you may leave your lover And summer time you are alone Autumn's when the leaves are falling And on Winter Hill we'll fall in love again . . . .

He ordered up a Happy Meal; He sat down with his kids I cleaned the salad trolley; I put out more plastic lids He didn't speak to me, although I tried to say "Hello," His daughter had an army doll called "Cinderella Joe" She was fighting with the ketchup, she was climbing up the fries She went flying off the table into shark-infested skies He yelled, "Molly, get on back here," When she brought the doll to me She said, "I'll fight your carrot sticks with ghosts of Mr. T" And I said, "That's a nice dolly, though she's missing half an ear," He stood and shouted, "Molly, get your body over here!" She said, "I'm only talking with this lady on the phone," He said, "There's people you should talk to, people you should leave alone." And I gave her a coin from Cuba, but he dropped it on the floor He said, “You can’t take things from strangers as they headed for the door Chorus: And I guess he thought that because I work at McDonald's I have no soul That a body can serve a Big Mac when it's on remote control That serving fries would rob me of the dreams I have at night That I'm not here, that I don't feel, that I don't reach for light The preppy crowd comes in at lunch and orders up a storm College boys and college-bound in sweaters that look warm They talk about the girls they like and how they'd like to score But when a girl walks in they don't discuss it anymore And it's like this plastic shield up, like I'm wearing a disguise They say "I'd like to screw someone." They don't avoid my eyes Chorus I got this job four years ago; I go to school at night I came here from Havana with my mom to start a life My grand-dad was a writer; I have his book at home For pages it's a story, then it turns into a poem He wrote it all in Spanish, crossed out every other word It's a kid out in the countryside, a crooked flying bird He wrote it on brown paper in a kind of jagged scrawl And though no one else could read it, still he had to save it all I read it every night now, as I try to go to sleep My fingers smudge the pages; How can paper cut so deep? Well did you see me at McDonald's, trying to look into your soul? Staring off to outer space like you were on remote control? It's not like it's so bad if we keep missing in the night Shedding mounds of fast food wrappers as we're reaching for the light I'll clean up your fast food wrappers, just keep reaching for the light

Yesterday I felt so bad I thought that I could die So, I went on home and watched on my TV Where I saw a man who told me of the story of my life And all the things that happened in between Chorus: And I don’t know what you’re thinking We’ve come so far, but we’ve still got far to go We skip school and go drinking Lose ourselves in the February snow Get lost in the February snow I’d like to try to take the time to tell you all that’s on my mind But I’m scared that it might frighten you away I awoke to find the frozen dew upon my windowpane As the snowflakes fell so perfectly today Chorus (Bridge) It takes a lot some times Just try not to get upset Good things they will come to you Like a child in the dark We go stumbling through the night With no one there to see us through All the snow that’s falling through my window in my room Can’t take the pain of bygone days away How we clutched at railings made of ice and then we slipped and fell And I remember what you whispered on the way Is that still what you’re thinking? There are dreams that are too beautiful to know Did we kill them all with our drinking? Or did we lose them all in the February snow? In the February snow

I was lost without a clue on the day that I met you And my feet were growing bright green blisters Then I turned into a field and instantly was healed When I saw you walking with your sister Chorus: I’m so happy that I found you And I hope that you will never go away I’m so happy when I’m around you I want to be with you each and every day I was lost without a clue on the day that I met you I was tripping over my own shoelaces Then you taught me how to tie them into butterflies And we went soaring over hills and churches Chorus And still sometimes this fog and thunder fills my mind, and I am stumbling, I cannot find which way to go Through the darkness that comes all around me like a shroud, you’re Leading me towards the light I was lost without a clue on the day that I met you I was hanging out in subway stations I was wrapped up in a book, didn’t know quite where to look When you came and brought me inspiration Chorus

A long time ago in the January snow Where we trudged for hours with no sense of the time We were younger then, and we were not yet friends We were just two lost angels bumming rides by the side of the road Then you came to me like a whirlwind And the burning asphalt started to bend I saw Orion had no place to end So I named it after you instead I turned twenty four, when you broke into my prison door And two worlds collided, and life as I once knew it ends You taught the stars to me Beneath the shady Sycamore tree I was ugly then, but you chose me And showed me the lights of fluorescent beauty Lost in the rain, our course was like the launching of a space plane And you showed me the stars in your head that shined like daffodil streets Maybe we’re plagued in the heart, and letters and words tear us apart There’s happiness these days, but it still beats the heck out of me If gravity can pull us apart And ghosts can travel through our art The waters weep and the oceans part By your spotlight silvery moon You don’t seem to care what people think or say anywhere You can look a thousand miles in a heart and stare While the world thinks that we’re buffoons It don’t seem to go. Don’t seem to know what I used to know Just searching for the thoughts that I lost on the tip of my mind And it’s crazy that it rained again A rabbit squirrel said you were my friend Is the beginning just a space to the end Like the line of the shore and the sea? Don’t get lost in the game Even when the flame comes Or if peace could sound like a victory drum Or if the next driver saw my hitchhiking thumb Cuz we’re the lost children of the universe And Life ain’t free, but it still means a lot to me And maybe someday we’ll learn what it’s all about

I knew it was time to hit the road When I finally started learning my way around Can’t get too confident It throws me off And your voice was always loud and clear You said that I would love it here “You can really feel the difference; Nothing but good will in California.” And I thought that it might be a city full of People like you People who’d stop and ask you how your day was People with your kind of way of filling Up the whole room I don’t think I could be in a bad bad mood around you Oh no.. So I got off the plane I couldn’t believe that I was here And we went speeding down that endless highway You said, “Those things out there are palm trees And they’re swaying on their stalks I like the way they move It makes me happy And do you feel happy now, You’ve come to San Francisco? Send a hundred postcards out to everyone you know You can stay at my house Take a bus out to the mission And practice your guitar all day As if it was your home.” You thanked your friend for the ride We reached your house We went inside You said, “It looks like a crack house But it’s affordable housing And as I stepped into the hall I saw the bright blue writing on the wall It said, “come and find your vision.. Come and find your hope In California.” And the window was open and I felt the fog come and Enter my dreams But all my sleep was stolen by awakenings So I went outside in the half-grey light and Wandered the streets I thought that I could make it there in bare feet And I saw the sleeping town and lights of San Francisco A woman laying out upon her roof to catch the moon And I felt your presence in the air My God, I’ve missed you Like a lighthouse always, Julie, Shining out across the fog I came home after a while With battered feet and something wild That I found on the corner of fourteenth and Elsie You put it in a vase By a statue of Jessie Helms you’d made Out of pink triangles and a broken coat hanger And the paintings that hung on your wall were of Crimson and Purple and gold You said, “They have their secrets but they can’t be told.” And skipping you took my hand and said, “Let’s dance on the beach You know the sand is finer and the air is sweet In California.” And I felt the sand between my toes in San Francisco And I touched the ocean and the ocean tasted me And I sat and played guitar for folks at Frieda’s Pizza On a warm night in the mission And they said, “You must come back soon.” And I came back every day But summer turns to fall, and I heard Massachusetts call And like a leaf in Autumn I had to find the ground I went to say goodbye to all my friends both low and high And I planted a flower by a chinkapin tree And in the midst of the rust and the cigarette butts I planted it deep And it was leaning lightly out Towards the breeze And I planted it high on the top of a hill In the afternoon light And then I had to go back down and catch my flight Home And I feel you in my blood and mind like San Francisco And I feel your earthquakes from the other side of town And if you should come back East to Boston, well, I’ll kiss you I do remember you now most especially in the fall

When I was five, my parents went away on a one week vacation. I went to the door, and who did I see? The best Grandma in the nation! “Hey Jon, Jon! Grandma’s here! Do you know what that means? We get to stay up late and watch movies, and eat lots of ice cream and go to Brigham’s!” Chorus: Life is good, yeah, life is sweet Grandma's here so let's have a treat Come sit down and watch a movie Eat some cake and feeling groovy Grandma let us stay up late that night to watch James Bond in For Your Eyes Only And Grandma seemed to have her eyes on Roger Moore She said, “That Roger Moore is quite handsome.” “Jon, Jon! Do you think Grandma and Roger Moore could get married?” “Wow! That would be so cool! Grandma married to James Bond!” “I get to sit next to Grandma.” “No, I do! It’s my turn!” “If Grandma sits in the middle, then we both get to sit next to her.” Chorus Grandma told me she came from Foggia Which is across the Adriatic Sea . . . I said, “Grandma, let’s go back there and visit someday,” But she said she can’t because she’s an alien . . . “Jon, Jon! Grandma said she’s an alien . . . Like ET . . . I wanna go ride in her spaceship!” Grandma drives her blue Buick Regal spaceship really slow She drives 10 miles per hour in a 40 mile per hour zone She points to a sign and says the speed limit is 16 “Grandma, I think that means route 16.” Chorus Someday when I’m older, and they find a cure for cooties Maybe, I’ll have kids and grand kids of my own And we can go feed the ducks, and walk through the autumn leaves, Eat lots of ice cream, and watch movies! Chorus “Jon! Mom and Dad are coming home today, and you know what that means! Grandma’s going to have to go back to her house, And no more staying up late and watching movies and eating lots of ice cream.” “Grandma, Jon and I were thinking . . . Even though mom and dad are coming home today, Maybe you could stick around the house for a bit?”

This hot day suddenly turned so cold In its gusts I am enveloped In my pocket I have these photographs That have never been developed I picked the last ripe fruit yesterday My boss said, "Well, you'll be on your way." But I didn't save enough to Get back to California yet And when the cold wind tugs my shoulder Tries to pull me where it hides I see you standing over all the summer Flowers that have died Chorus: Take me in, hold me close Winter's coming like a ghost That I can see on the horizon Stealing the green from all the trees And myself, I feel me stripped Bare and empty like the wind And you can clothe me in nothing but your love If you want to try it out San Diego winter's just a cooler shade of summer You have to go Up to the mountains for a flake of snow Failing life and failing love I left there fleeing pictures of A world I was too familiar with to know And I met you by a maple tree Out by the railroad tracks And I cherish all your kisses And your hands upon my back Chorus And I am ragged, I am just a dusty traveler Can you polish off this rough and quarried stone that is my heart? I will do the same for you We'll make it through this winter Even if it is the coldest one on these newspapers' charts I'll take you in, hold you close I know the thing you fear the most Is getting stranded, being covered by the ever growing snow I'll keep you warm 'til the spring When the world wakes up again I'll take you in, leaves are falling I'll hold you close, snow is coming I'll take you in And you can clothe me in nothing but your love