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lyrics

The heavy rain it falls in sheets
On empty cobbled lamplit streets
Through which a desperate man retreats
Hoping to receive the thing he’s paid for
Beneath the tower clock he waits
Upon his deeds he ruminates
He means to flee but hesitates
Trying to remember what he came for
With bloody hands he holds the rain
But whether his or someone else’s pain
He feels now passing slowly from his heart into his brain
There is no guessin

A shape from out the shadow shows
That looks to be like one of those
He’s seen before and thinks he knows
If only for the wryness of the smile
It asks him: has the thing been done
He throws the shadow back its gun
With all the bullets there but one
That was used to kill the meantime for a while
The darkness as he begins to go
Says: but what about the pay I owe?
Don’t you want to hear me say what by now you must already know?
Or are we even?

You run from justice and you run from strife
You’re tired of your ransomed life
Like Abraham you lift your knife
Obeying the commands that are provided
You’d like to be somebody else
You’d like to do things for yourself
For consolation you can keep your health
And hope the grieving soon will have subsided
You believe in everything you’re told
I’ve done so much worse for less than gold
But tell me for what price have you gone away and sold
What I gave unto ya?

The portraits of the patriarchs
Went overboard to feed the sharks
You can hear the dog who cries and barks
Calling for the master who’s abused him
The soldiers sleep in tents in yards
While the wounded nurse removes the shards
Of razorblade behind her heart
That got there who knows how or for what reason
You’ve travelled on the beaten path
As men before and men since have
And you say some day we’ll both look back on this and laugh
To keep from cryin

The swallower of swords has said
What doesn’t kill you will leave you dead
Worship your heart and you’ll lose your head
This is the only law you can get by on
I ain’t the devil and I sure ain’t God
But right now I’m all you’ve got
So you can quit me or take your best shot
Either way you can’t go back to where you came from
You lent to me your traitor’s kiss
Yes, and they’ll make you a man for this
Tell me when I’m gone do you suppose you’ll miss
Your old companion?

The dice are rolled, the lot’s been cast
You’ll take the present with the past
The future’s not what comes at last
The future’s what precedes the end of knowing
The detectives organized the clues
The fingerprints and the bloody shoes
All the stupid words we used
Trying not to get where we were going
I know you knew it all along
In the name of God, what took so long?
For you to out and say that you’ve been wrong
From the beginning?

A story may have many sides
An individual several lives
But all were killed and one survives
And I alone am he that’s left to tell it
So gentlemen and ladies, here
Of the jury, court, and everywhere
Bring your witness now to bear
Wherever the prosecution seeks to rest it
And the next time that they come for you
Be sure to tell them what to do
You thought you laid it out and saw it through
But you were mistaken
The fires in the hearths are low
The winter never means to snow
The wind it never tries to blow
But these things all must have their explanations
Inside the darkened mouths of thieves
Are rotten teeth and mustard seeds
Tongues that keep the truth diseased
And knowledge well contained by reservations
And know before they aim and shoot
You never loved me, you just followed suit
Your eyes were only ever set upon the loot
Of which there is none

credits

from Unravelled Tales - Volume 2, released July 24, 2021

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Sam Steffen Boise, Idaho

Sam Steffen is a Pennsylvania-bred, Boise-based singer-songwriter whose songs are the torch-wood for a new generation of folk music that has learned from the best stuff in the tradition and aims in spite of everything to keep the human spirit alive and kicking. A versatile musician and skilled finger-picker, Sam is at heart a story-teller, and a prolific one. ... more

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