Joy Harjo's Web Log

Here is the final draft of the lyrics of one of the ten tunes of the new CD. This was the first song I wrote using Band-in-the-Box and the versatile Garage Band program from Apple. Both are useful programs for songwriters.

Also note there was an earlier version of this lyric. It has been through several revisions. Most of my creative work goes through revision, some more extensive than others. This is why I have shied away from blogging...I prefer to let the work develop in private, perfect it, then let it free.

THE LAST WORLD OF FIRE AND TRASH
c Joy Harjo/Katcv Publishing ASCAP



I don’t know anything anymore
or if that cricket is still singing
in a country where crickets are banned.


I’m Indian in a strange pastiche of hurt and rain
smells like curry and sweat
from a sunset rock and roll restaurant.
A familiar demon groaning with fear
has stalked me here, ruins poetry, then
his swollen pride commandeers.

Chorus:
So long, goodbye, oh fearful one.
My desires had turned into a small mountain.
Of dirty clothes, sax gig bag, guitar
books, shoes and grief
that I packed and carried
from one raw wound to another.


Beneath the moon rocking above Los Angeles
or outside the stomp dance fire of memory,
I told him, you can choose to hate me
for going too far, or for being a nothing
next to a pretty nothing like you.


I can’t get betrayal out of my mind,
out of my heart
in this hotel room where I’m packing for home.
I’ve seen that same face whirring
in the blur of a glass of wine
after the crashed dance,
the goodbye song
in the last world of fire and trash.

Chorus

The most dangerous demons spring from fire
and a broken heart, warning of bittersweet aftershave
and the musk of a thousand angels.
And then I let that thought go running away
because I refuse to stay in bondage
to an enemy, who thinks he wants what I have.


The last council of peace was disrupted by this fearful beast,
as I fled from the house of my mother
through this severed country.
I turned my cheek as my head parted through a curtain of truth
and erupted from the spirit world to this gambling place--


And I send prayers skyward
on smoke.
Release this suffering.
Let the pretty beast and all the world know peace.


I refuse to sum it up anymore; it’s not possible.
I give it up
to the battering of songs against the light,
to the singing of the earnest cricket
in the last world of fire and trash.