In the year of surprises, the odds they told a lie
No one predicted Bob Dylan would be the guy
How do words come into fashion
How do prizes seal the deal
Philip Roth, after the Nobel, how does it feel
You can decline to speak, you can skip this interview
You can turn a cheek or just keep doing what you do
Some folks they serve a tasty dinner
Some folks are seated at the meal
On the day after the Nobel, how does it feel
You’re the second child of man who sells insurance
You’re the second child of Herman Roth and Beth
You accept a prize and the prize accepts a place on your desk
You write for your whole life, you try your best
We all need validation though we’ll tell you it’s not true
Even Toni Morrison said the prize meant something to her too
In the year of surprises, the odds they told a lie
No one predicted Bob Dylan would be the guy
How do words come into fashion
How do prizes seal the deal
Philip Roth, after the Nobel, how does it feel
You can decline to speak, you can skip this interview
You can turn a cheek or just keep doing what you do
Some folks they serve a tasty dinner
Some folks are seated at the meal
On the day after the Nobel, how does it feel
You’re the second child of man who sells insurance
You’re the second child of Herman Roth and Beth
You accept a prize and the prize accepts a place on your desk
You write for your whole life, you try your best
How the gates magically open
Keepers of the gates will not reveal
On the day after the outcome, how does it feel
There’s no denying a hard rain is coming too
And the times they much be changing, we’re tangled up in red and blue
Maybe the stakes are over-rated, maybe prizes speak too loud
Maybe all anyone ever wanted was just to make their parents proud
Will we go on turning pages, Philip Roth believes we won’t
He says the screen is taking over we used to read and now we don’t
Why do some folks come in second
Why oh why do some folks win
The answer is blowin’ in the wind
PHILIP ROTH SONG
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HEY GARRETT
Hey Garrett
What did you do with the poem I gave to you
Did you tear it
Or keep it forever like I always seem to do
Like the notes that we wrote and the ticket stubs
Dried flowers wrapped up in a bow
Do you ever think of the two of us
Or did you just let it go
Hey Garrett
I still have the birthday perfume that I got from your mom
I still wear it
On special occasions like cleaning the attic alone
Where I still have the blanket and all of the cards
The pinecone we found in the snow
Do you ever think of the two of us
Or did you just let it go
Remember when people were
Skydiving out of the air, at the fair
Under a parachute
We saw a woman and we loved her hair
Hey Garrett
Love isn’t something you freeze in a popsicle tray
Once you share it
It stays in the weather if you let it melt away
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BROKE DOWN HOUSE
She showed up at the picnic
With a steel guitar and a thumbpick
I was turning a sweet sixteen
A little bit shy and a little bit green
We grew up in the same patch
In a pile of hay we were a good match
We got hitched and found some land
The sweetest dream, it all began
At a broke down house
With a crooked porch
We got a rusty swing
A tikki torch
A shady tree, a barbeque
A freeway breeze and an alley view
Our family is framed on the wall
We got a broke down house but our hearts ain’t broke at all
She grew a garden out of the gravel
We got a broke down house
With a crooked porch
We got a rusty swing
A tikki torch
A shady tree, a barbeque, a freeway breeze and an alley view
A leaky sink, a creaky stair, a cracked up window with a curtain tear
The roof got rot, the gutter's shot, the fridge ain't cold and the stove ain't hot
A couple a chairs, a couple guitars
A couple stray cats who think they’re ours
Our family is framed on the wall
Sometimes wind goes whistling right through the hall
We got a broke-down house but our hearts ain’t broke at all
We got a broke-down house but our hearts ain’t broke at all
While I’ve been writing my novel
Hammock love in the afternoon
There’s a rockabye baby due in June
At our broke down house
With the crooked porch
We got a rusty swing
A tikki torch
A shady tree, a barbeque
A freeway breeze and an alley view
A couple of chairs, a couple guitars
A couple stray cats who think they’re ours
Our family is framed on the wall
We got a broke down house but our hearts ain’t broke at all
Everybody said we'd move when that agent offered payment
For this piece of land with our hopscotch paint on the pavement
But we made our statement
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I HAVE, I WILL
You want to know if I’ve wished upon the setting sun
You want to know if I’ll hold you as my true love and my only one
You want to know if I smile when I think of all the mornings
I’ll get to wake up next to you
I have, I will, I do
You want to know if I’ve cried over how much I care
You want to know if I’ll carry this laughter to the rocking chair
You want to know if I dream in the bitterness of winter
Of dancing by the fire with you
I have, I will, I do
And I don’t imagine our days will arrive drenched in pure sunshine
But the darkest days that come along, we’ll bathe in candlelight
You want to know if I have fallen like a daffodil
You want to know if I will hold you steady, without holding you still
You want to know if I see this love as a promise
And every day a chance to renew
I have, I will, I do
I have, I will, I do
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THE DAYS ARE LONG
I spy a pillow fort
Propped up with a double sheet and an ironing board
A cardboard castle hideout on the rug
Inside a tugging hand
Drags my day away from how I planned it
I’m landing on this spinning planet where
Ooooh, the days are long
But the years fly by and then they’re gone
Ooooh, the days are long
But the years fly by and then they’re gone
Sometimes you grow up fast
You learn too soon that love was meant to last
heads and she says
Ooooh, the days are long
But the years fly by and then they’re gone
Ooooh, the days are long
Riding the open wind
A kite is like a treasure map to ice cream
Peanut butter cookies, sweet dreams and
We sense this little life
Is shorter than the time it takes to plan it
So why do we take for granted that
Ooooh, the days are long
But the years fly by and then they’re gone
Ooooh, the days are long
But the years fly by and then they’re gone
Far beyond the body and the bones
And so you change your mind
Look the dishes in the eye and tell them wait for later
Ooooh, the days are long
But the years fly by and then they’re gone
Ooooh, the days are long
But the years fly by and then they’re gone
And the record player spins old-fashioned musicals
And Peter Pan keeps landing on our ledge
And he’s telling us the tale of Never Neverland
While Tinkerbell is singing in our
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