Sometimes, when I'm listening to a song, it has to be a certain kind of song, I lose every ounce of my ego and I get completely lost. It's an ecstasy like nothing else, like a communion. I feel that way when I listen to The Trapeze Swinger by Iron and Wine. It breaks my heart in all the right ways. It's seriously, deliciously soul crushing. It's the words. It's the cyclical verses and how they go and go and go, same, same, same like a meditation, a chant almost. It's the layering of instruments: chimes, guitars, voices layering, little percussion, big percussion, piano, words, words, words, true little daggers hitting it right on the head, right in the heart, bull's eye. It's ethereal and yet logical, artistic and yet intellectual. How? I don't know! I don't know! But it is. It's the best worst thing for someone like me, all that truth and beauty in one ironic verse after another. Like my life, almost. One dance with irony after another. Do I seek it? Is it my fault? Do I have something inside me that draws me toward impossible things on purpose? Am I trying to fool myself? Convince myself and everybody else that I really AM trying? But time after time only going for things that I know are doomed? It's possible. But how does one stop? Apparently I am a sucker for lost souls. This manifests in a myriad of ways. I date people who are addicted to harmful things. I date people who are emotionally unavailable. I date people who don't believe in God. I date people who don't work. I date people who don't like themselves very much. I date people who are in love with other people. What am I doing? And more important still, why am I doing it? Am I one of these sad persons who loves hopelessly arduous challenges? Oh, poor little girl. I hope not. I am generally a happy girl, full of effervescent bubbles over just about anything. My default is laughing. I am most myself in a laugh. But I do such unfunny things so often. I find myself admiring the most unsuitable partners. No joke. Can't laugh.
I had a talk with one of my favorite men in this world last night. He is my friend and confidant. We were talking about my latest love interest. I was sharing my hopes a little bit. He said some of nicest things I've ever heard. I can't share it all due to the sacred nature of the material but I will share this: he said he wanted me to be happy, truly and purely. He told me I was such a good girl and that he sees me as such a fearless sort of person, navigating in a world where it would seem I don't really belong and doing so with absolute grace. I just kind of wanted to fall down dead asleep right then and there and just call it a day so that nothing else could intervene and ruin a perfect day. This friend of mine is so sensitive a guy, the gentlest, strongest, purest kind of person, full of actual love for others and so clear and expressive about it. He was concerned about my crush. He said I was the most emotionally expressive and honest person he knows and that he hoped I'd end up with someone of that caliber. This person I am crushing on seems a most unwilling character, emotionally anyway. That conversation got me thinking, what would it be like to be with someone absolutely harmless, I mean truly guiless? What in the world does that feel like? Someone without any secret agendas, no lies, no names to call, no girls on the side, no secret debts that I'll have to help pay off, no colossal ego issues? What on earth would it be like to have something honest and sweet and just kind and pure and then have it actually last? I know these guys exist. I know them. Some of them are married. Some of them are related to me. They really are that way, just unabashedly lovely, loving, generous, attentive to their wives and children and friends, me included. My band is composed of such individuals, I am happy to say. Because of this unique union we are able to enjoy playing very honest and moving music, without wit, without wanting credit, without vanity. The world can be so vapid, so substanceless, so irrelevant, mechanical, crude, and meaningless. When these moments of meaning unfurl, often unexpectedly, it can be so renewing, energizing, and inspiring. I'm just grateful for how often I get to experience these moments and how the friends I've been blessed with, the people I've chosen to be mine, offer such treasures with such regularity. May I never become so spoiled I forget to notice my miracles.
Please listen to The Trapeze Swinger
Trapeze Swinger lyrics
Please, remember me, happily,
by the rosebush laughing
with bruises on my chin, the time when
we counted every black car passing
your house beneath the hill, and up until
someone caught us in the kitchen
with maps, a mountain range, a piggy bank
a vision too removed to mention
But please remember me, fondly,
I heard from someone you're still pretty
and then they went on to say that the Pearly Gates
have some eloquent graffiti
like: “we'll meet again” and “f*** the Man”
and “tell my mother not to worry”
and angels with their great handshakes
but always done in such a hurry
and please remember me, at Halloween
making fools of all the neighbors
our faces painted white, by midnight
we'd forgotten one another
and when the morning came I was ashamed
only now it seems so silly
that season left the world and then returned
and now you're lit up by the city
so please remember me, mistakenly
in the window of the tallest tower
call, then pass us by, but much too high
to see the empty road at happy hour
gleam and resonate just like the gates
around the Holy Kingdom
with words like: “lost and found” and “don't look down”
and “someone save temptation”
and please remember me, as in the dream
we had as rug-burned babies
among the fallen trees and fast asleep
beside the lions and the ladies
that called you what you like and even might
give a gift for your behavior:
a fleeting chance to see a trapeze-
swinger high as any savior
but please remember me, my misery
and how it lost me all I wanted
those dogs that love the rain, and chasin' trains
the colored birds above there runnin'
in circles round the well, and where it spells
on the wall behind St. Peter
so bright on cinder gray in spray paint:
“who the hell can see forever?”
and please remember me, seldomly
in the car behind the carnival
my hand between your knees, you turn from me
and said the trapeze act was wonderful
but never meant to last, the clowns that passed
saw me just come up with anger
when it filled with circus dogs, the parking lot
had an element of danger
so please remember me, finally
and all my uphill clawing
my dear, but if I make the Pearly Gates
I’ll do my best to make a drawing
of God and Lucifer, a boy and girl
an angel kissin’ on a sinner
a monkey and a man, a marching band
all around the frightened trapeze-swinger
nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah …
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8aPyBr-_S0
