Sunpowder

 

 

Danger in love

Love

When you find love

Then you begin

To live again

 

There’s a cry of incantation

Drowned as traffic

Glissandos stream

There’s a laugh

Of invitation

Sounds like the prelude to a dream

Why should we still believe in love?

 

In love

You know the way

Tonight

There’s a sense of expectation

You wear a style

Of simple grace

I heard you pray that there’s still time

I had to pray that there’s still time

Why should we still believe in love?

 

Love

Are you crazy love?

 

Love

When you find love

Then you begin

To live again

 

Tonight

We have nothing left to prove

Tonight

Somehow

We felt just too hazy

Can’t remember

Just how young love felt

And even though

We’re tired we can’t surrender

Can’t surrender

 

But feel inspired

To feel the fever

To field love

To feel it all

In all its faded splendour

In all its raging glory

To know that once again

We will surrender

To love


The Dutch Venus

In Kelvingrove

I will remember

The bright-eyed Venus

From the Low Countries

I see her smile

Yet I’m reconciled

To a great love gone wrong

 

I just can’t recall

At all where love came from

At all where she came from

But maybe if I tried

Surely If I try

Surely if I try…

 

If Paris could choose

Could choose again

He’d choose the Thurmanesque

He would call her name

Touch the softness of her wrists

Kiss the fullness of her lips

Kiss her Florentine breasts

 

By Kelvingrove

I just surrender

For the Venus of Leiden

Is just so out of reach

But what a heady heady fragrance

Such a beautiful poison

That we call love

 

Last night

I heard myself sing

“nothing else exists”

“nothing else is real”

Can I tell you something

Nothing left to trust

And everything is love

When everything is lost

When you sold your trust

when it’s way past midnight

 

In cinemas

Coffee houses

Golden buildings

On empty streets

The Thurmanesque

The Florentine

Sunpowder in the Glasgow sleet


The Angel on Ruskin

Believe it or not there’s an angel on Ruskin

I saw her up there with my own green eyes

She danced along among the chimneys

Her golden wings caught the evening sun

 

Hardly knew if I was still breathing

As I lost my way on the eastern stairs

She trashed my car she trashed my paintings

As ribbons flew from her midnight hair

 

I was always in love’s power

Always in love’s power

down on my knees

 

All was lost and

All was broken

Brought to heel

Like an anxious guest

On the eastern stairs

I stole some token

I chased a kiss

On her golden crest

 

I was always in love’s power

Yes always in love’s power

Down on my knees

You would fall

Should you look into those eyes

 

Believe it or not there’s an angel on Ruskin

I hear her laugh and I hear her sing

There’s evil abroad there’s a stranger on Ruskin

And memory lies like a girl on the wing


Delft

I love the sweetest stranger

Willowy and blonde

I find her as

Fortune comes to claim her

And she’s gone

 

I hear her as she calls

I love her as I fall

I love her as these

Maddening sirens call

With a madness

Bold as love

 

I love her as she calls

I love her and that ain’t all

I love her as these

Maddening sirens call

A madness bold as love

If I

Could just be

The One


Weem Rock Muse

She gave me a kiss

She gave me the sweetest kiss

In the village of Weem

She moved thru’ the brightest dream

 

And somehow life means nothing to me

It’s as though I don’t exist

Like I’m lost in the Scottish mountains

Alone in the Scottish mist

 

I followed my star

I followed my brightest star

Yes I followed my star

I followed my guiding star

 

She was my muse

She was my Weem Rock muse

She was my muse

Yes she was my Weem Rock muse

 

And somehow life means nothing to me

It’s as though I don’t exist

Like I’m lost in the Scottish mountains

Alone in the Scottish mist

 

She was my love

She was my only love

She was my muse

She was my Weem Rock muse


Faithless

Faithless

Will you be my girl

Faithless

Will you rule my world

 

Unchained

Unchained

 

Nameless

Why do I call your name

Shameless

Why do you hide your shame

 

Your shame

Your shame

 

Faithless

Will you be my girl

Faithless

Will you rule my world

 

Unchained

Unchained


She’s Gone Forever

Will you cry yourself

To sleep for a night

Yes I think you

Probably will

 

No reason

No quarter

No rescue in sight

Should I reach for

The poisonous quill

 

I just can’t believe anymore

She’s gone forever

And is new love

A vanishing dream?

 

Will I walk the streets

In vain every night

Yes I think I probably will

No reason

No quarter

No rescue in sight

I won’t reach for

The poisonous quill

 

And I just can’t believe anymore
She’s gone forever

 

Way back

Way back home

Sunday morning

Sat in the window

Was a brown-eyed Scottish girl

With a name that rhymed with dusk

Then you missed spring and blossom

She made you feel

All the beauty

All the sadness

Of what’s gone

And whatever you do

Whatever you say

She’s gone forever


Send Me Your Halo

Late one night

Cupid revealed

I was gone for you

I was under his wheels

 

No porch lights

But I watch from the shore

I couldn’t take too much

Not too much anymore

 

There’s a girl somewhere

In Northern Spain

She fell in love with me

In my pursuit of fame

 

All Summer long

We danced eight reels

She went down on me

In the Elysian fields

 

Send me your halo

Send me your sacred grain

In the street of the willows

We’ll remember your name

Remember your smile

Remember your style

Remember your touch

To lose everything

Would be too much


For Saskia

Could you love me

Love me

Love me

As I love you?

 

Your namesake brought

Rembrandt to his knees

Likewise love for you with me

But was it just a dream

Was it really just a dream?

 

French girls will ask you

For your cigarettes

And pleasure and regret

 

I couldn’t keep you

For too long

But I can keep you in a song

Forever young you seem

Forever in a dream

 

If you see Saskia

Maybe you could ask her

Ask her how she feels

How does she really feel

And I hope she finds love

Finds the perfect love


The night is young

The night is young

Young is the night

The dream is over

Long live the dream

 

In the street

We hear mandolins

The winding violins

And our hearts

They’re much stronger

They had been broken

Now they’ll mend

 

Can you hear

The beating of wings

The beating of angel’s wings

They will follow

They will follow us home

 

I kiss you once

I kiss you twice

On a tenement stairwell

 

The night is young

Young is the night

The dream is over

Long live the dream