2. AN EVENING OF EXTRAORDINARY CIRCUMSTANCE

Tonight I'll sit around pushing my shit down the drain
using a plunger and a clothespin
while I wrangle with the chain
Tonight I'll have potato chips
and watch my favorite shows
then watch some infomercials
then watch some tv show
Tonight I'll have 9 or 10 beers
Tonight I'll talk on the telephone
mindlessly until my ear burns from the feeling
from the strain of active nothing
Tonight I'll avoid my hopes and fears

Tonight I'll play shitloads of video games
Tonight I'll decide too late to go get on the train
and play out my stupid, misguided version of fun
Tonight I'll get stupid fucking drunk
and be an idiot, ashamed of what I've done

Tonight I'll bang out another shitty song
thats unsatisfying.
It's been so fucking long since I really felt any other way
Tonight I'll crumple up these lyrics
and throw them away.
Tonight I'll make promises I know I'll never keep.
Tonight I'll talk on the telephone
wishing i had the energy to sleep
Tonight I'll sit around and bitch
Tonight I'll get hungry staring
at the mustard in my empty fridge

Maybe tomorrow I won't smoke no cigarettes
Maybe tomorrow I won't look back on tonight with vomit-soaked regrets
Maybe tomorrow I won't drown myself in spite
Maybe tomorrow I could try
and tomorrow can be better than tonight!

Sleep well and dream!
Plastic pillow that give way to someplace green
Sleep well and dream!

3. KEVIN COSTNER'S CASINO


4. A GUIDED TOUR OF CHICAGO

He shuffled up a pair of surfer slippers and an old tweed blazer
Asked you for a quarter and you looked the other way
He leaned up against the tow zone sign
And just in time for you to avert your eyes
Said "Good morning sir. Have a nice day."
She wears four wool winter hats all year round
And mumbles and sometimes screams
He wears a coat made of burlap sacks
And sits in parking lots, never asking anyone for anything
He's the old black guy with the shopping cart
She's the old lady with the bright blue sweat pants
They're the two young white squatter kids
with dirty undershirts and rotten teeth.
He's the guy who hangs out underneath the overpass
Shouting curse words at passing motorists
Or the guy who passed in my alley
Who drank until his life made any sense
He's the hustler on the train
Or his four accomplices
Living on three tattered playing cards and slight hand

He's Darron in front of 7-11 on Walton and State
She's Babs up and down on Belmont right by the train
He's Buddy and his wife in Uptown, by the Aragon
He's Andy selling streetwise at The White Hen in Boys-Town
He was Ed from southside who gave me cigarettes and hope
At Walgreens on Belden and Clark
Where inspiration dies alone

Yeah, these are the people in your neighborhood
They're the people you don't see
When you're walking down the street
They're the people you don't see each day!


5. TAKE ONE DOWN AND PASS IT AROUND



6. SOMEDAY WE'RE ALL GONNA WEIGH 400 LBS

the girls, they don't love us anymore now, because we wear black shirts and took a new vow.
you can have the whole world right in your home, to redefine and eliminate "alone"
our tv's do the jobs of a thousand violent cops
keep us inside while misinformatoin supplements our thoughts.
our kids know just what they need; more monitors and screens
and you tell them you can't take it anymore
but you stay inside and order your food from the grocery store.

your pager, you cell phone, your laptop, your mobile home
your soloflex, your microwave, your chinese take out/pizza days your suburb, your SUV, your nursing home for your granny
your problems have all diappeared.
technology betrays your fear.

and if i'm lucky, i'll never have to see another hunman being
except the guys on my money, the girls in my magazines,
the athletes on my tv screen, the people who have sex with me via virtual reality
no garbage man, no postman, no guy from 7-11,
no store clerk, no soda jerk, just my companions i plug in.
a pyramid for a modern day pharaoh

the global village can be yours if your modem's not too slow.
and i can thrive and don't even have to try.
download my ashes in my hard drive when i die

7. THE NORTHSIDE, THE L&L, AND ANY NUMBER OF CRAPPY APARTMENTS

Snow piled on tables, upon scales, into bags
Late night beer and smoke, too sleepy and awake
crazy eyes over eggs, crazy eyes like mine
cloths from a streetcart, too much beer for the time at hand
night time passed by me again

phone calls that should never be made
phone calls that speed last night into today
So, where will you be in ten years?
This is the part where you don't say, "right here"

Smoking pain's a pang beneath the left ribcage.
Gasping idle breathing
Burning to these thoughts of leaving
Was it cold hands gripping fears of being all alone in the world when I got there?
I'm choking in my sleep!
Fostered aching tension
Demented bruised inventions
Unbelievable, burnt out and seasonal
and I've been saying this for years.
Packing bags, not cleaning all of last night's empty beers.

A war of words waged by the faithless
Screaming in deep sleep
Unjustifiable stagnation

So, where will I be in ten years?
hopefully I won't be here!

So, where will I be in ten years?
Nose and eyes betray
So, where will I be in ten years?
You never did believe me
So, where will I be in ten years?
under my own skin

This is the part where you don't say!
This is the part where you don't stay!

8. SMOKESTACKS

9. DETENTION

10. UPTOWN FREE RADIO

11. EIGHTEEN INCHES

Face down on the ground.
stormclouds lie in white snowpiles all around.
i don't know if i can make it through one more winter in this town.
voted worst in show the last two years.
i got a refill on my tears-
another bottle of foam yellowed clear. the old man twitching on the train reminds us of mortalitly,
the snow everywhere reminds us of the rain.
and my burned and brittle skin, cracked and blistered in the wind is testament to repetition
as the impossible happens again.

so, what's your new years revolution?
take off those ten unsightly pounds.

the snow is piling higher
and your face is growing closer to the ground.
raising your glass at the office party or photocopying your secretary's ass is no less pathetic than our self righteously self important tasks
of barfing rhetoric on shiny table tops
as our collars and turtlenecks choke us right there in the coffee shops.
winter will not wait for you.
ironically, your worst dream has come true

Pontification means nothing

when i woke up and looked around,
I found that my dreams had melted into dirty puddles on the ground
On the ground!