looking back its so easy to see the mistakes
oh bitter regrets
oh how i blew it time and time again
oh how i wished id listened more
and kept my mouth shut more often
how i wish i’d thought things through
and i’d been more polite
behind a typewriter i was tap tap tapping away
making up lies and lives
fact and fiction
i tell you truthfully
for these lines are hazy to me nowadays
if you tell a big enough lie
you can adorn it with enough imaginary baubles
you can bullshit the people with words
you can make it seem like anything happened
you can put it to music and they sing along
singalong as one to your sad songs full of lies
the huge lie contains a tiny truth
such a delicate truth
it will not suffer a name
the big lies open you up
after all you enjoy them…i guess
the enormous blatant lie
the monstrous fib
the wild exaggerations
cute little white lie
the obstinant guff
the opaque denials
stuff made up on the spot
spot made up on the stuff
saying any old thing
any old thing you thought was clever
or cos it rhymed
or cos it fit the bloody meter
singing isnt saying though
im not saying singing isnt saying neither
you can sing and mean something
you can say what you like
you can say something youd never sing
singing says something you could never say
music sing with winged words
music can say something even without singing
what does music say so wordlessly
she sings but not in words
she comes in singing
music
music saying and singing yet doing neither
anyway
many can say
few can play
fewer can sing
fewer still can sing and mean something
and very few
mean anything
to you
the piano speaks to me
joy and triumph
pain and sorrow
no words
it has no words
it speaks in broad sweeps
it speaks in tiny creaks
it speaks in decaying shadows
it speaks in sustaining haunting overtones
it speaks in its hammers n wires
it speaks in its pedals n wood
inside its mysterious chest music is created
oh most beautiful and self contained of all instruments
even in silence your beauty speaks in spades
the possibilities you contain are endless
you need no words
your fingers will find the words
your fingers push down here and there
oh the subtle textures of touch you must master
i used to see my father play the piano
the piano became an extension of my father
my father used the pianos voice
to sing his songs he wouldnt think of writing
the keys went up n down
the pedals went up n down
out came his english blokey cockney song
a song about all the pretty girls hed met
a song about cold london winter
a song about the second world war
a song about all the other wars england had been in
a song about smoking cigarettes n drinking tea
a song about earning yer crust n paying the bloody bills
a song about fixing cars and watering the lawn
jaunty confident relaxed stuff
he took over on the piano
with no self doubt
no hesitation
he never wondered if hed make a mistake
tho he almost always did
he could sit down at a piano anywhere
and strike up a good tune that people liked
you didnt have to have read his reviews
he didnt need amps or eyeliner neither
its all relative
if only if only if only
i only got part of what he could do
the way it came so easy to him
i say how you know what to play
he say i dunno my fingers just go
piano
yes i had piano lessons
but i never learnt nothing
he didnt need no lessons
his fingers just go there on their own
why wont mine?
look i let them do as they please
oh no what a racket daddy-o
why didnt i get this bit
i have the desire that it should happen
i expect it should happen
it never happens
oh piano
not so easy to get to know
sometimes piano or music
she reveals more than youd dared to hope for
some lovely undeserved intimacy
oh music i love you
oh music sleep with me
oh music sing to me in a piano language
the original language of love
music
later
came
the words
lovely torch songs to make me weep
unrequited love and mournful ballads
i like sad songs
is this sad?
nevermind
hold that thought
think it up on your own
chop up a little language
sprinkle on some fairydust
some flakes of congealed nice
some allegorical herb
some harmonic edge
simmer
cook
shoot
camera
recording
live!
and over to you…..
probably in hollywood