I remember yesterday

When I'd sit and watch the hound dogs play

Howlin' at the China moon

Now yesterday is the busted balloon

Life was young and things were easy,

Days were short, nights were warm

Times were good

Hate was shallow

Love was crazy and I had it in my marrow

And I swear that I've seen your face somewhere back in that time

and in that place

Do you remember

The old house stood like World War Two with just two rooms

and a hall to be used

The lady was mean

Just slightly unclean with a heart of cold silver and gold

The kitchen smelled of kerosene

Celing hung down unveiled the rotted beams

and the man, they said, his work it could have hung in the Louvre

Now he sits around all day because his left arm won't move

He was a master of the art of electricity

He lectured on tubes and circuitry

He was self-employed, but he could never see his way into the light

He had a room full of switches and dials and lights and

a head full of clouds and eyes full of sight

And when it got dark,

I could hear his heart beat like a mother in the night

She stood like a guardian ready to give everything up

If I had asked for a sword and her blood in a cup

but there was just a time when I asked for too much

She sighed because she could not give it

We used to sit beneath the tree just the lady, the radio man and me

And I think it was the winter of '63 the man went away and let us be

It was early on an August day that the lady decided she too must go away

For her heart it seems could not pay the price for what her body was buying

I came home from school and I found the note

I went into the kitcken and lit the old stove

With senses set on overload

I turned on the TV, spent the rest of the afternoon watching

all my old cartoons thru the hall

and across the porch was the sun surrendered like a crying torch