You won a prize for that,
for telling lies like that
So well that I believed it.
And I never felt cheated.
You were the chosen one,
the pure eyes of Noah's dove.
Choir boys and angels
stole your lips and your halo.
In your reckless mind,
you act as if you've got more lives.
In your reckless eyes, you only have time and your love of danger
to it you're no stranger.

[ Merchant ]

[ bassoons: Kim Laskowski & Atsuko Sato ]

It crawls on his back, won't ever let him be.
Stares at the walls until the cinder blocks can breathe.
His eyes have gone away, escaping over time.
He rules a crowded nation inside his mind.

He knows that night like his hand.
He knows every move he made.
Late shift, the bell that rang, a time card won't fade.

[ Merchant ]

If you intend to live again,
then open your eyes and don't pretend you're feeling there's nothing worth believing.

God, if you persist you'll die like this,
and wither in the midst of your first season,
cut down with no reason.
How can you be so near and not see everything?

If you intend to live again,
then take the outstreched hand of the one that needs you.

[ Buck/Drew/Gustafson/Augustyniak/Merchant ]

[ percussion: Paulinho Da Costa ]

I dreamed of a circle, I dreamed of a circle round.
And in that circle I had made were all the worlds unformed and unborn yet.
A volume, a sphere that was the earth, that was the moon, that did revolve around my room.

I dreamed of a circle, I dreamed of a circle round.

[ Merchant ]

The still and silence is torn with violence.
A loud breaking sound in the night is made.
Hear it grow, hear it fade.
The sound you're hearing, the sound you're fearing
is the hate that parades up and down our streets, coming within bounds and within reach.

Now, inside the place we hide away, we hear it near and hope it turns away.
Turn away...

[ Drew/Merchant ]

[ alto sax: Maceo Parker/tenor sax: Alfred "Pee Wee" Ellis/trombone: Fred Wesley (together: The JB Horns)/percussion: Paulinho Da Costa ]

If lust and hate is the candy,
if blood and love tastes so sweet,
then we give 'em what they want.
Hey, hey, give 'em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy 'cos they wanna turn it on,

[ Merchant ]

[ viola: Mary Ramsey ]

"My, how you've grown."
I remember that phrase from my childhood days too.
"Just wait and see."
I remember those words and how they chided me, when patient was the hardest thing to be.
Because we can't make up for the time that we've lost, I must let these memories provide.
No little girl can stop her world to wait for me.

[ Merchant ]

[ cello: Larry Corbett/violin: Bruce Dukov/viola: Pamela Goldsmith/violin: Ralph Morrison (quartet arranged and conducted by Paul Buckmaster) ]

To think of my task is chilling.
To know I was carefully building the mask I was wearing for two years, swearing I'd tear it off.

[ Spoken intro from: Women's Diaries of the Westward Journey (by Lillian Schlissel) ]

"While the young folks were having their good times
some of the mothers were giving birth to their babies.
Three babies were born in our company that summer.
My cousin, Emily, gave birth to a son in Utah,
forty miles north of the Great Salt Lake one morning.
But the next morning she traveled on

[ Buck/Drew/Gustafson/Augustyniak/Merchant ]

[ violin: Mary Ramsey ]

That summer fields grew high with foxglove stalks and ivy.
Wild apple blossoms everywhere.
Emerald green like none I have seen apart from dreams that escape me.
There was no girl as warm as you.

How I've learned to please, to doubt myself in need,
you'll never, you'll never know.

[ Merchant ]

[ alto sax: Maceo Parker/tenor sax: Alfred "Pee Wee" Ellis/trombone: Fred Wesley (together: The JB Horns) ]

Times are far between, and few I bet, when we can look upon our lives without regret.
Of all the things I have done, you think I'm proud of everyone without exception?

'Till you make your peace with yesterday, you'll never build a future.

[ Buck/Drew/Gustafson/Augustyniak/Merchant ]

We are the roses in the garden, beauty with thorns among our leaves.
To pick a rose you ask your hands to bleed.
What is the reason for having roses when your blood is shed carelessly?
It must be for something more than vanity.

Believe me, the truth is we're not honest, not the people that we dream.
We're not as close as we could be.

[ Buck/Merchant ]

These are days you'll remember.

Never before and never since, I promise,

will the whole world be warm as this.

And as you feel it, you'll know

it's true that you are blessed and lucky.

It's true that you are touched by something

that will grow and bloom in you.

These are days you'll remember.

When May is rushing over you