All's I'm Sayin'

Running a race, sand in your face
You can't compete with the people you meet
Peer pressure's bad, so is your dad
And you hold out hope that you will not repeat
But you don't mind mom though she ain't so calm
And the radio can act like a savior
But just like the church, leaves you in the lurch
And where's your behavior?

He was a jock, punching the clock
But he got the girl and you don't, well, not yet
But you can't go far (at least in a bar)
You see them kiss and try to forget
He wanted to fight, you ran away
You thought you'd win this way
But life passes by except when you cry
The magic's a martyr

Chorus
I'm not saying that you are wrong that way
I'm not saying that it can't work that way
I'm not saying that I've not felt that way
All I'm saying's it isn't me that way

You're not like them, and cannot pretend
Unless you're coked up and maybe not then
It isn't a hex unless you want sex
Or a salesman to come as a friend
Up in your vault, the thought it's your fault
Comes and goes nightly
But it's not so bad the life that you had
It's just a version ( a virgin, aversion)

Repeat Chorus

Chris Stroffolino (2005, Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

Waste of Time

You blame the tea that you forgot to drink
For how it's gotten cold
All dressed up with no safe place to go
I couldn't crack your code
It went on like this for years
It's well known most men hide their fears
The flag's at half-mast to prove you do too

People live to move away
But somehow now I guess I know you
Dwell on it for long enough it turns into society
Maybe you fake sex for love
And maybe men fake love for sex
Maybe I just show more than I say
Or say more than I see
And you were something that I was
Coz I could not be part of me
Society is leaking out

The hero's a braggart
And victory best a welcome mat
To a house that's locked
A key is lost (but I can't tell you that)
Somewhere deep inside the mission
There was a fire that cried
Long Live The Logs
But it couldn't burn with thoughts of you
I need some faith in pointlessness to talk on it

They said, You undressed me just because
You needed to possess
Hear the bio-logical clock tick
You needed to act quick--
But I don't think that's what happened with us
We followed the map but missed the bus
But that don't mean it wasn't just
A waste of time
(solo)

If you don't want to hang with me that's cool
Don't have to make amends
I don't trust you but I can be your fool
I mean I'll be your friend
Think I'm gonna go outside
And maybe lose my wounded pride
And then it doesn't have to be a waste of time
Think I'm gonna go outside
I swear I'll lose my wounded pride
And then it doesn't have to be a waste of time

Chris Stroffolino (Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, 2005)

Less Misogynist (When I'm With You)

Some women want it both ways
The old way & the new
To fight on corporate frontlines
& still be wooed, not woo
& get time off for babies
While men slave to be true
But that's OK

Some women want to guilt trip
Or maybe it's just wiles
It might be even spiritual
Like nature's back in style
But it's harnessed to a system
Advertising cars
It's not their fault!

There's something beyond the mailman that can live in us
But that don't mean that it's mystical
& when those teachers, preachers, tell us they're a bridge to it
We know that they're really a wall

Because I used to fear the women
Who wanted to be free
& had contempt for others
Who chained themselves to me
But I feel like I'm less misogynist when I'm with you

I know you don't ask me to choose myself or history
But I might do it anyway
& judge it's worth by what I feel cannot be known of me
& refuse its right to get in the way

Knotted by a need that thinks it's non chalant
It's too bad she didn't want me
But not too bad she wants
& I feel like I'm less misogynist when I'm with you

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

Fire Side of Me

Though it doesn't have to be so long before I die
Though I might spend years in the WHITE LIE
Though I fear I'll get the axe if I become a tree
Keep it on the fire side of me

I'm burning for you in the cold I'm freezing in the heat
The bitter taste of coffee's getting sweet
It makes me feel the flowers sting the honey from the bees
Keep it on the fire side of me

Oh you take it to the market coz you need a place to park it
But you're pretty sure it all will turn out right
And I keep it in my closet coz someone says easy does it
And I'm trading in my days for lonely nights

I know that I've been winter for you know that I've been ice
I'm melting in your mouth I pay the price
Though you try to hide it I think anyone can see
You keep it on the fire side of me

To find love in the city like a needle made of pity
In the haystack of the hustle and the bust,
You know that I've been burning to be everything your learning
I don't fear our flame's the tragedy I trust

You make me want to stay awake all day and sleep at night
You make me want to bark instead of bite
You make me want to hold onto the things I can not see
Keep it on the fire side of me, yes you do now
Keep it on the fire side of me.

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

Shock And Awe

Sergeant came up to me, said "be all that you can be"
Thought I might go enlist though I am a pacifist
At least it's not 9-to-5, I know some guys get out alive
& get out of the slums, 20 years beating drums
Never once had to shoot targets who don't salute
I thought I knew the score, then they sent me off to war

I was looking at a magazine of walls
While they removed my retractable claws

Underneath the missile sky, proud to be the go-to guy
Didn't want to be-weak, fed my head on doublespeak
They said it's all a game, "pin the blame, get acclaim,"
But if we don't attack, they might want their money back
So said general CEO, always the last to go
Find out the best defense isn't a good offense

Fuck detachment, though that's the main way that I cope
I want you here, I could say goodbye but I don't

Free the kurds, empty words. Talking heads, countless dead.
White house horse, show of force. Death machine, Mr. Clean.
Purple hearts, bombs that smart. Hold a coup, make it new
Heed the call, shock and all. Watch them fall, watch us fall

They say your privileged in the way of life you know
But it's despite them, if no one yet as bombed your soul

If they bombed my block and murdered my friends
Maybe I'd have something to defend
Maybe I'd need to settle the score
In passion's heat, is that a war?
There's two sides now to this unrest
Both want out of this mess
Both tell the world what they think is right
One screams "calm down!" The other shouts "fight!"

Pick your poison, which dictator should you choose
Or cry your heart out, when the winners find they lose.
You can leave, and cheat on me with Mr. Luck
Short of nowhere and outward till you duck

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

Ultimatum

When you said you don't feel it I knew I had to conceal it
No, I couldn't express it because others possessed it
But I couldn't resist it, though I couldn't assist it
Will you say that I stole it because you couldn't control it?

Just because it's yours doesn't mean it's not mine
Doesn't give an exclusive
Just because it hurt when you thought I flirt
Doesn't mean that you didn't

And you, you gave me an ultimatum
You couldn't love me unless you hate 'em
You thought you couldn't love both

It's distracting you're subtracting all these feelings from your dealings
I was bending, you were spending our last dollars on a wallet
Went though motions, no emotions, did you make me workaholic?
Beast of burden, I was spurred on by desire just to catch you
Nature's calling but you're stalling and I'm falling for a statue.

I thought we could be free if you stayed with me
Like I was an anchor
But I knew the latest war that brewed
Was just to free an oil tanker

And you, you didn't see how I had to forget you
You didn't know that was how I met you
I wasn't putting you on
And you, you gave me an ultimatum
And when I found you needed to date them
I didn't think you'd be gone

Oh the silence feels like violence but you say I'm impatient
I'm an oldie, but you told me, if I wait more I'll be ancient
All the paintings we were tainting in the "Die Young" Museum
DADA art is a start but we still hope to free them
But there's no time left to think it's an expensive addiction

You didn't melt you said you never felt
That when you talked I knew how to listen
When you said "friends" it still seemed that your ends
Were to get me to see what I'd be missin'

And you, I think you might have stayed my lover
But you knew you could find another
You thought he'd only have one
And you, you never wanted to be my baby
You just wanted to have a baby
I guess I wasn't the one I guess I wasn't the one
It seems I'm never the one, unless there isn't a one.

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

You Don't Believe In Nothing

The more you say the more you hide
I think I smell a rat
I know why the caged bird sings
It wants to tease the cat

You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing

Double standards make you cry,
Especially your own
You purge yourself but wake to find
You're still flesh and bone

You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing

The void is luggage, holds you back
But you return for one last snack
Empty fire's not so wild
Demand's a parent, supply's a child
False glamour lures you here
But you have to pass through it to get better
Love will lose its looks
But tonight you want to get inside its sweater

So if she says don't look just touch
Her "hi" might mean "goodbye"
When desolation's lottery
Is gouging out your eyes

You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing anymore
You don't believe in nothing

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)
I'll Try To Understand

You said I was grumpy and yes I was grumpy
I blame it on coffee not you
I just wanted water but settled for slaughter
And bachelors who told me I'm cool

But baby I'll try to understand
All the things you say with your hand

Clubbing a genius coz he hasn't seen us
We choose our corrupters with care
The frame that acts finished
Does not eat its spinach
And nothing is putting on airs

But baby I'll try to understand
All the things you say with your hand

I am not talking but you are not talking
It must be some voice from the dead
No one's to blame and the moth and the flame
Switch sides in their sleep on our bed

And baby I'll try to understand
I'll the things you say with your hand

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

Night's Quick Specimen

To say their floor's your sky, you didn't think it's be that meaningful to you
You want to cry, but it's never gonna break it in two
I wonder why I feel better when I think I'm glued to you
And it's not hard to die when you know there is no place you are going to

I think you thought you knew, tears make you feel so you can see or be again
Unless we live in flesh, and a blink is just a night's quick specimen
I close my eyes to cry, it's death to always want to have to keep them open
And I can't see clear unless I like in someone's visionary coffin

Somedays you lose me so you can choose me
Somedays you fear we cross the line
But when you touch me I know how much we
Could ever help me leave behind

So I could tell you know that it's time to stop your sobbing and be cute
Or I could play on you if you let me trade my drumsticks for your flute
I smile through my tears, though I could never make them or you my own
And after all these years we still spend too much time just talking on the phone

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

World Is Upside Down

High above the subway where the books forget their names
She took a job as waitress 'cause she got sick of her fame
A way dreams it's a little car stalled upon a hill
And all the cops are pregnant and the crooks are on the pill

I know the world is upside down, I know that verb is just a noun
I wouldn't mind life on the streets if the grass were not concrete

Your pent up in the city coz you can't get out but through
With anger and with pity for the few who make it new
But you fear the age of reason has got stuck under your skin
And you feel it's time to reach out but you know you should turn in

I know the world is upside down I know their smile is but a frown
I wouldn't mind bummin' around if my head weren't on the ground

"The system might be fair if you are a billionaire
And believe in laissez faire and you think you have prayer
But you overdosed on hope at the feet of corporate popes
Their peace sign sure looks cute, but it still avoids the roots"

Ah, the war your telling me is wrong got stuck inside your protest song
And even when you get the gong you're glad it's front page news.
Now that you got a megaphone, go tell the world you can't condone
That has been overthrown, but you ain't got a clue...

No trust fund ever trusts me and freedom isn't fun
When love's too shy to lust me and the moon's blocked by the sun
But the bankers must be moral and the war is not for oil
And democracy is not a drug that simmers but can't boil

I know the world is upside down, etc...

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

Wherever It's Grey

It's better to have loved and lost
It's not like it's a holocaust
She got you hooked with just one look
Though you weren't the husband type

Oh she couldn't waste her time
On jealous games that they play
Nothing that you could do
To get her to stay, wherever it's grey

Dad sad, "Son she was too free
The country life's the thing for me
Settle down and buy a horse
And have three kids then get divorced"

And oh when you first met
She said you'll be hard to forget
Nothing that you could do
To get her to stay, wherever it's grey

(solo)

She had a sign up on her wall
"Save me from what I want," it said
But you could not protect her
When you held too tight and dying's dead

And oh, lightining's brief,
Put it in cages then,
And oh, the night's more dark
Whenever it ends, whenever it ends,
Whenever it ends

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

Santa Cruz Song

You did what they told you
Your food was their spit
You took so much comfort
In knowing you fit
But there was no love there
Or if there was it couldn't last
Their banquet table
You leave in search of a fast

Your tired of their heaven
And sick of their hell
Your tired of buying
Do you have to sell

You tried to do neither
Tried to run away from it all
You felt otherworldly
But they sold your whirlpool as a wall

(instrumental)

Math becomes music
When pain becomes spam
Society's got you
So let the kids jam

On police horses
You may interrupt their games
If you feel cheated
Know by now that they feel the same

Chris Stroffolino ( 2005 Stoic Forlorn Fish Songs, BMI)

EXILE IN BABYVILLE:

HOWDOYOU KNOW IT’S RAINING?Why can’t we keep what they’re taking? Why can’t we sleep without waking up? Who says that business is pleasure.Always the same if you don’t want to make it your lifeWho says the sky is a ceiling? Why don’t we once get caught feeling up? Why must the sun hide the sunset? Always the same if you don’t want to make it your life(He says his dog is his best friend. I say my cat is mine).Why is her beauty elusive? Why is my love so reclusive? Why can’t we meet without medals? Always the same if you don’t want to make it, always the same if you’re not really naked tonight.WHERE ARE YOU TOMORROW? Maybe Philly Maybe France. Remember back when sorrow made you deaf so you could dance? It don’t work that way no more and all you know of love is loss and tenderness mucks up the store where you’re the bull but she’s the boss.Forget her now forget her friends forget these tears they never end forget the time forget the place forget the folks you can’t replace I was just your party until I got crashed by rent-a-cops. They fire blanks at manikins until the elevator drops. Then I am your basement or maybe just your flower-bed but I can’t accuse you when I’m lost in what I never said Forget her now forget the past forget these tears they never last forget the laughter forget her room forget that Sunday brimstone gloom. We could sit in darkness in a theatre spotted with our lives or be naïve as food that’s sick of trying not to eat the knife. Things could be better things could be worse this kiss of night could be a curse. I could be lonely I could be blue but no more than I was with you.IT’S NOT A MATTER JUST OF ME You blindfold me for breakfast as if you’re some sleep that I could be. It wasn’t all that reckless the way sex kept reminding me my mind was somewhere else, a house that couldn’t be a home that’s never been remembered much less felt, that will not be an icecube just to melt. I couldn’t find a reason to be oh so sad and lonely when you said you were my love you didn’t mean I was your only. It’s hard to think of things to say without someone to say it to, and it’s not a matter just of me. No, it’s not a matter just of me.Oh I couldn’t see a way I could be alone but not free—it’s just another way that you got me. And I know that it’s just my love that doesn’t have to be above the body that I couldn’t find when people put it in my mind. I couldn’t blame you for illusions that you stole from me but it’s hard to kick your door down when it’s sky, and if I were not you I think I’d cry. Someday in the morning I will even think I used to see, but it’s not lookin’ in one eye it’s only looking in all three but I wasn’t lonely before I met you and it’s not a matter just of me You didn’t make me want you only saw that I already did I guess you thought that that would be enough. I guess you thought a man would call your bluff. BREATHE UNTIL YOU’RE GONE At first I tried not to make you weep but I couldn’t unless you’d sleep. You thought that I just faked the ache so now you’re gone on the make, but I never could be part of nations made of Prozac or Viagra I had cigarettes and coffee and sometimes a snack I knew that I had problems and you called it my condition but I didn’t think that it was worse than yours I still don’t think that they were worse than yours. That don’t mean that I didn’t care but there are some things I couldn’t share and I guess when push came to shove I loved you less than love. So I guess you had to leave and by the time that I believed you held another in your arms who beat your dog just like a drum I’m glad to know he was a shrink who slipped his drugs inside your drink and didn’t know you had to cry to come. It’s okay that you had to cry to come. What was happening baby? What was happening with you? What was happening? What was happening I think you’re as stuck as me. I think you thought that you were perfect and I don’t know why it was that way, thought you were enough I understand although I stooped to see. Never thought that I was told I’m flattered by your love but I don’t think I could breathe until you’re gone So I guess I must go through them, tell myself I was true to them. Anybody else knows my name. What world I could not blame, what world I could not blame.SO DENIED “Sick of drama pin me down until I’m bored, barren ground. Chip my shoulder make me yell make me ice break the shell,” Didn’t think that I could ask too much of you, but I didn’t ask enough, always missed my cue. I don’t know. I could land that aviation job for two, but the unwatched pot is simmering for you. The sun gives the trees light but asks for no fruit but a blight. It’s pathetic or profound, the stillness that’s going round. Can’t love death, can’t love life. Know yourself or cut a knife. So much sadness so much fear so much warmth before you’re hear. In my dreams I don’t find anything to hide, and I never thought that I’d be so denied.FINGER-POINTING SONG. Goddamn the seasons in hours goddamn the guns put in flowers goddamn the big inside the small goddamn the laws. Goddamn the town’s got no center goddamn the suburbs that spent her goddamn the car goddamn TV goddamn the malls. Capitalism is burning the bridges you built with your hands or was it your heart. My finger is on it my finger complicit and when I am kinder I’m smart. Goddamn the blown-up skyscrapers goddamn the ones that still rape her goddamn the eye goddamn the tooth goddamn the lie the goddamn the truth Goddamn the little love rations goddamn the one-week vacations goddamn the sleep that had to act like it always kept up. Three in the morning the clock won’t stop ticking my finger keeps pointing my love is long gone I’m pointing at you coz it’s something to do but violence is making me yawn. Goddamn the mind that’s a muscle goddamn the hustle and bustle damn the machine with the machine that’s really the sky. Goddamn the webs I was weaving if they are not what I’m believing goddamn the fly who wouldn’t die or even say Hi until it said Bye. Goddamn the God I’m invoking stand up for laughs you’re provoking goddamn the self high on a shelf or is it a cry? EVEN NOW You found your friends in jail and you lost yourself at sea. You sold yourself to nature like you were society. You feel that you hit rock bottom and don’t know why it’s not late autumn, but you won’t meet the morning till you stay up all the night. Even now you’re glad it’s not never. Even now. You’re glad there’s a line. You cross it back and forth so often the sneezing’s a repeating coffin that sanity’s been known to soften the solitude the clock is scoffin’. Science and religion gang up on you but in vain. Bosses say you’re too much in your mind or down the drain. Beauty’s skin-deep so is knowledge all that crap we learned in college all the engine’s horny sounds you have to hide to fight. Call it religion or call it a mess. It’s a condition you don’t have to confess, cause ecstasy is always waiting even when you’re calculating lots of folks will call it dating but it feels like masturbating. So woo me in the evening like I’m all got up in drag, woo me like a kid who woos his country’s checkered flag. Surely he’s a patriot and that’s why he can’t sew or knit and if you change your mind I will not have to be a nag MONOGAMY Gone are the days when you thought things went your way with a flick of the finger or your wrist and got on the side where you didn’t want to be while dressing up in sheep’s clothes to be kissed. So long ago when you thought you were a show You were too busy being seen to look. Time cast its spell and you thought you knew it well but you could only read it like a book. I can’t compare to me I can’t pretend the way that my beginning was someone else’s end and if I must start again I feel that I must see that there’s a way to look at you and not have to see me. You got nothing against monogamy but you feel you’ve been taken for a ride, when you find your girl’s been nicer to me than she is when she’s taken as your bride. Back in the past when you thought it’d never last you made a pact with gamblers out of fear and dressed it up in jewels but they turned out to be paste it glued you to her side but you needed beer. Selling the places you’d like to run from now you didn’t think you’d banish where you brook and you could tell her that she was your outer shell in hopes it’d get you both off of the hook. Oh tenderness comes like a cloak from the cold it keeps you wamr enough to let it slip but without it now you are learning a vow that still sounds unconvincing from your lip. I got nothing against monogamy but I feel I’ve been taken for a ride when some other girls are nicer to me than the one that I’ve taken for my bride.
GOT A LOT TO LEARN. I tried to keep it to myself I guess I was afraid I’d shine to bright for me if not for those who paid for someone else’s truth for someone else’s stance who loved me for my mind in someone else’s pants. I stored too many nuts the silo wouldn’t burst but then a flash-flood came to quench my desert’s thirst I cannot find a middle living in extremes but maybe that’s life’s riddle not so hard as seems, and I got a lot to learn. I will come down from this I know I will subside if I could find your kiss and not a wall of pride You love me from afar you say that I’m a star but sometimes in the night it gives to little light and gives too little hear but everyone I meet seems colder even still until I pay their bill but I can’t wait that long and so I sing this song in hopes you understand though love can’t lend a hand and I got a lot to learnYOU SHOULD GO DOWN All this global market shit man it’s killing me. They mobilize the army, force me to be free. Put it on a TV that’s shaped just like a heart. They tell us we are moving when we have yet to start. They call me Unabomber, they call you terrorist. They do it in the name of health, they shake it like a fist coz liberty’s a statue and love is a cartoon, and sure we’d like to live there but we can’t afford the room. You should go down before you know it in your mind that’s what I told myself but it made me blind. They give you to a little room where you can hope and dream and if you pay until you’re sore they’ll let you plot and scheme. You’re running around in circles but it’s cheaper than the store where the peace they try to sell you is another name for war. Maybe there’s a way around this world of rich and poor Maybe you can play their games enough without their score. Maybe you can find a way to leave it all behind. Maybe you can live somewhere that isn’t just the mind. But in the meantime baby you live a dream deferred You go out drinking maybe—silent keep your word. I meet you in the dumpster and if we start to kiss it’s not a happy ending but at least it’s not an abyss. You should go down before you know it in your mind that’s what I told myself but it made me blind
MAYBE YOU’RE RIGHT  Anger sits closer to love than fear it lets me know that you’re not here. Why won’t you come back why won’t it change? If I’m not normal you’re stranger than strange. It’s okay. Maybe you’re right. It’s okay, maybe tonight. Practice makes perfect. Theory makes art. Marriage is love the horse is a cart. I am a cynic unless you’re one too. No one way mirrors; the jungle’s no zoo. It’s okay. Maybe you’re right. It’s okay. Maybe tonight. If I was an outlaw you were the law. One day you broke it and made me a wall. I got my pride so I turn my cheek. If you’re not strong I’m weaker than weak. It’s okay. Maybe you’re right. It’s okay. Maybe tonight. THE HEAVEN YOU LEFT ME I could take the common course and sell my kingdom for a horse and yoke it to the carriage you call love. But knowing me I’d sell it cheap and you prefer I buy a jeep and you won’t let me kiss you unless I shove. But I hate this rat race or maybe I don’t know my place I want to fly but trade my wings for shoes, and walk around this gooseshit lake. It’s corporate night but I’m awake and I don’t sell m kingdom if I haven’t paid my dues. Taking out another loan I told myself I held my own I had to see more couldn’t take a stand. I saw the punks die or sell out I thought that I could wait it out but soon my youth just sunk into the sand but that don’t mean it’s over yet and I don’t have to pay this debt by turning into everything I hate for you have no authority to tell me what’s been ailing me and when I know that honey yes I almost feel great. So I don’t know what’s left to do I hope that is okay with you. I love you like I never loved before and it’s okay you had your say and maybe that you’re far away but too bad if we’re stuck inside the store and though I don’t know what you want I feel your love is not a front for what I hate about society and if I have no soul to sell no kingdom to trade for a hell I’ll hold on to this nothing like the heaven you left me