In a Market Dimly Lit

The bird that plucked the olive leaf
Has been circling like a record 'round the spindle of my mind
Where the needle's worn the grooves too deep
And scratched the wax that's blistered from the heat besides
From any movement in the room
If my cat walked by the arm skipped, but to my surprise
My interrupting cat improved
The sound already so severely compromised

The needle's worn the grooves too deep
The needle's worn the grooves too deep
The needle's worn the grooves too deep
The needle's worn the grooves too deep

I'm a donkey's jaw on a desert dune
Beside the bush that Moses saw
That burned and yet was not consumed
She's the silver coin I lost
I'm the sheep who slipped away
We pray with fingers crossed
But you listen patiently anyway

I wrote a little song for you
A melody I borrowed put to words that didn't rhyme
To repeat what you already knew
As the stones thrown at your window tap in syncopation
You kept a distance out of fear you'd break
But what good's a single windchime hanging quiet all alone?
The music our collisions would make
Is a sound that turns the road-that-leads-us-back-home into home

The music our collisions make
The music our collisions make
The music our collisions make
The music our collisions make

I had a rusty spade but I'm not the fighting sort
If I was Samson I'd have found that harlot's blade
And cut my own hair short
Then in a market dimly lit I'd come casually to pay
You see my coins are counterfeit
But you'd accept them anyway

So spare me your goodbyes
Your waving-handkerchief-good-byes
Given my tendency to err so on the sentimental side
I'll spare you my goodbyes
The truth belongs to God
The mistakes were mine