TIDES OF TIME - LYRICS

1. Love I Found A Flood

Love I found a flood
The flood was deep and wide
It stretched over the back streets
Out to the countryside
The flood was dark and wet
Chilled my legs to the bone
My feet swelled in my shoes
Tripping on the bracken overgrown

Love I found a flood

Love I found a flood
It trampled all the grass
It swept the debris from the stone
And cut off the underpass
The flood split all the seams
Of the fattened river’s banks
And in its putrid water
The wrigglers writhed and stank

Mosquitos as big as Fairlanes
Hovered there above
Worms swung from the streetlights
Safe from the water spiders’ arms

Oh love I found a flood

Love I found a flood
What a flood it had become
Its’ fingers stretched across my spine
Slowly blocking out the sun
But you don’t see the flood
Do you my old friend
You don’t feel the dankness rising
Or see the path’s eroded end
You don’t see the city streets
Shrivelled to a husk
But my love you’ll never see
The beauty of the dusk
When the flood is lit like coloured glass
Lying peacefully and still
As it covers all the ugliness
Of the city’s darker will
When it reflects clouds and handsome birds
And old souls flying by
You asked me why I love the flood
And that my friend is why

Oh love I found a flood

You see the flood is both these things
The darkness and the good
The flood is all around us friend
I wish you understood

2. First Frost

The very first frost of the year lies on the paddocks glistening
My Daddy used to stand right here for the big rains listening
When daddy died I took his place, oh I watched them old black mountains
Now the hard times have settled on my face, this country ain’t no wishing fountain

But I will stay until I crumble into dust beneath the sky
I will move my hands through the dirt and wait for rain until I die
‘Til the last head’s sold or I’m too old I just don’t know what else I’d do
My Daddy always said that we get what we’re given and that’s why I’m not shooting through

When I was a younger woman I loved a broken man
Oh he’d set my chest a-heaving
He asked me one night for my hand
But that one chance I had ended up leaving

But I will stay until I crumble into dust beneath the sky
I will move my hands through the dirt and wait for rain until I die
Til the last head’s sold or I’m too old I just don’t know what else I’d do
My Daddy always said that we get what we’re given and that’s why I’m not shooting through

3. Featherweight

I danced into the morning ‘til I couldn’t feel my feet
As if to sit and rest a while was a signal of defeat
I clamped my hands over my ears, I spun so fast around
And I prayed that I would never ever come down

But we are told that even if we lose the fight
Everything’s gonna be alright
If we keep punching like we’re featherweights

I listen to the rhythm of the drums under the floor
So loud it gets me to the place I don’t think of you no more
I drink tonight as if the booze will re-incarnate my faith
But it ain’t faith but hope that got me to this sorry, sorry place

Cos we are told that even if we lose the fight
Everything’s gonna be alright
If we keep punching like we’re featherweights
All these years I ain’t ever won a round
Keep waiting for the bell to sound
I ain’t punching like no featherweight

So I’m gonna make sure this weekend never ever ends
Tonight nothing else matters, my life on this depends
I’ll chase you from the doorways where you lean quiet in my mind
And I’ll drink and dance and fuck ‘til I go deaf, dumb, numb and blind

Cos we are told that even if we lose the fight
Everything’s gonna be alright
If we keep punching like we’re featherweights
All these years I ain’t ever won a round
Keep waiting for the bell to sound
I ain’t punching like no featherweight

4. Tides of Time

I watched a wren flying past the window
The window to the room where my childhood slept within
I sat astride the fiery steed of eighteen
A champing racehorse waiting for the running to begin

There was a time I thought I’d stay forever
My first foremost endeavour to build a life here forevermore
My heart back then was as light as a feather
A kitten playing with a strip of leather on a sunny morning porch

How long will I go, I don’t know, I don’t know
I never felt the tow of the pulling tides of time

I went across where the snow was a blanket shifting
And the grey concrete was drifting under pylons in the rain
And we huddled close inside those old stone houses
Gripping drams to douse us with the liquors warming flame

And through the years as the city swelled and thickened
My sluggish heartbeat quickened when I thought of going home
So to pyramids and canyons and rolling tumbling rivers
And through rich fat wheat that shivers, I continued to roam

How long will I go, I don’t know, I don’t know
I never felt the tow of the pulling tides of time

Now I stand and breathe where the waves crash on the shoreline
And the sea winds on the borderline of vicious come to rest
Here on this sand were my toes first in the water
My innocence to slaughter, my bones growing in my chest

How long did I go, I don’t know, I don’t know
Now that I feel the tow of the pulling tides of time
How long will I stay, I can’t say, I can’t say
I’ll wait to be swept away by the pulling tides of time

5. The Road's Inglorious End

I watched the ripples push out wide
Cutting through that old lake’s tide
Just like the moon pulled me away from you
My head was on the blink
My concentration down the sink
My every vein fortified wine running through

As that key sunk ‘neath the surface
So too did my life’s purpose
To keep you for my very, very own
But a more honest girl than me
Stole your heart and now I see
I am destined to spend my next years alone

You found me beside a road
With a heavy, heavy load
This guilt I carry with me weighs a tonne
One trembling hand folded in yours
You helped me up and through the doors
Could it be my wandering life is nearly done

Took me where it was warm and dry
Tenderly you asked me why
My face was stained with hot fat tears
And we drank your finest wine
You told your story, I made up mine
And I felt as if we’d known each other years

You were wealthy I could see
First time it didn’t interest me
For love’s rich jewels were shimmering in my eyes
I was prepared to hang up spurs
Keep my hand from your fat purse
And even shut up my old shop of lies

Before long it was clear
There was another you held dear
A farmer’s daughter was the apple of your eye
Despite everything I tried
Your love for her was strong and wide
And I knew it was a waste of precious time

But I would not leave empty handed
A job as your servant girl I landed
You trusted me with all of your affairs
You told me how you’d become rich
Risen up from your poor father’s ditch
Showed me where you kept the safe under the stairs

I took this key from that safe’s lock
Left before the sun rose up
And clambered over fencing wire in the dawn
I was heading roughly east
Like some demented wildebeest
Until I came across that lake by the rows of corn

And so my love my words are true
All this love I had for you
Transcended my illicit urges all
But you decided on that girl
Chose to share with her your world
My resignation a jilted drunken lover’s scrawl

My reputation left unmarked
The safe I buried in the yard
The key I threw into that shining lake
For I don’t want your golden money
But now you and your sweet honey
Will have nothing a new life with which to make

Every steep hill, turn and bend
Until the road’s inglorious end
I’ll continue on my wicked, wicked way
If I combust or I fade
There will be no grand parade
The satisfaction of your life ruined pays my wage

6. Never Really Hit It Right

I got pretty fast to the bottom of this glass and here I’m gonna stay
If I don’t get off my arse I’m gonna miss another class
But you can’t teach old dogs new tricks anyway
And the kennel is warm

I’m meant to meet you later, be all there for you but somehow now I fear
That the wistful looks and the whistled hooks
Ain’t the ones I care to read or wanna hear
Oh I never really understood

But I’d meet you in the desert
I’d crawl there on my knees
Give you all my wisdom
And you’d give yours to me
But I never really hit it right

Realisation number one was that it all started out as fun
But you soon got your hooks into me
I was surprised to learn, my fingers getting burned
It ain’t just us women who get clingy
Oh the fire of love can burn too bright

But as the scales tipped and I soon got the hint
Expectations they were high
If the ideal in your mind ain’t quite what you find
You gotta do your best to try and change them, try
Try and make them what you want

But I’d meet you in the desert
I’d crawl there on my knees
Give you all my wisdom
And you’d give yours to me
I’d be a bright torch shining
I’d be a fortress high
That you could shelter under
And sleep sound through the night
But I never really hit it right

I’m gonna sit on this chair, I won’t go back over there
I think I’ve learned enough
Staring out onto the street, moving cars and walking feet
Everyone goes somewhere, everyone does it tough
I know it ain’t just us

I’ll keep an eye out for you as I wander on through this thing that we call life
I really hope you do find the one for you, the one you wouldn’t change because she’s right
I certainly ain’t the one for you

But I’d meet you in the desert
I’d crawl there on my knees
Give you all my wisdom
And you’d give yours to me
I’d be a bright torch shining
I’d be a fortress high
That you could shelter under
And sleep sound through the night
But I never really hit it right

7. Motel Halls

I’m not moving, or so it would seem
I’m like a rock at the bottom of a fast-moving stream
It was a long winter, the earth is heavy and wet
The air is still, the flowers ain’t bloomed yet

And still the sun rises and falls
Over valleys and stone walls
And voices ring in motel halls

It seems so long now since that fading light
When we lay folded together so tight
And from the outside came the baying of foals
While from the hearth warm glowing coals

And as the stream from a high peak falls
As the snowdrift slowly thaws
Our voices ring in motel halls

So if this river be my grave
If I have loved you too long for my heart to be saved
If you remember, throw in a pebble for me
When you’re walking the banks, if you’re likely to be

And tell her she is the luckiest of souls
To have you by her, between her walls
And that she never heard those voices in the motel halls

8. City Colours

These city colours yeah they move so fast
Summer revellers spilled onto the street raise a glass
To the hot day’s timely end
The wheels are spinning towards your street
The road still hot from the sun’s big heat
The sky is dark and blue, birds all flying home to nest

Well honey that’s right
But honey please don’t fight
Me and my fear tonight

I’ve been called a fool so many times
For never knowing how to read between the lines
What’s wrong with the words there on the page
I stared at your hands when we first met
They moved as you spoke casting a spell as the sun set
And I knew that I would hear you speak again

Well honey that’s right
But honey please don’t fight
Me and my fear tonight

So now we’re sailing on the dawn’s fair gale
And every second is consumed like fine dark ale
A sailor’s drunken song
I kept myself together from the start
But you’re the cat set among the pigeons of my heart
A mess of beating wings

Honey that’s right
But honey please don’t fight
Me and my fear tonight

Just like a bout of vertigo, the horizon’s heady spin
My distracted heart and foolish grin

It’s easy to believe the tide won’t turn
Easy to believe that damp wood will never burn
But let’s make a bonfire by the sea
I promise you I won’t walk away
You asked me here and here it is I want to stay
Reading those words on the page

Well honey that’s right
You don’t have to fight
Me and my fear tonight

9. You Always Wanted A Little More

I have been following you
I’ve seen you like a hurricane blowing on through
All those stomping grounds we hung around while we were still young
I still remember the smell of those old smoky rooms that we knew so well
Now the smoke is gone but the memories dwell in the walls like yellowing ghosts

Oh, that’s what you were waiting for
Oh, you always wanted a little more

Strange how the time seems to bend
All of the lines on which we depend
How we can still love so much when we don’t see each other no more
I lean with a drink in my hand watching you behind the microphone stand
You’re like a fish in the water, you do this so well

Oh, that’s what you were waiting for
Oh, you always wanted a little more

Go on swim even deeper my old friend

So I walk unsteady out into the night
I stumble down dark streets as you burn so bright
I ain’t unhappy, somehow you did this for the both of us
I wanna tell everyone, I knew what you were before these days in the sun
But that’s between you and me and our long history

Oh, that’s what you were waiting for
Oh, you always wanted a little more

10. Children

My regret and me and a cheap cask of wine
We meet every evening around the same time
No formalities, I’m at ease, we know us so well

And all down my street the lights go on slow
While righteous women brush their hair and their fellas get stoned
We’re still children let loose with each other’s hearts

Oh I saw the moon rise tonight casting walls between us
How much easier it is to say that I miss you more when you’re
Here than when you’re away

I know I’m not the only one who carries a bruised heart
After all we are all the same animal, the only thing that tells us apart
Is the one we miss; those eyes, that kiss, that voice in the dark

Oh I saw the sun rise today casting roads between us
How much easier it is to say that I miss you more when you’re
Here than when you’re away

That’s why when children get older mothers get scared
I wish I could’ve told her how unprepared I am