November makes lists, keeps bees, and retains her sweetness against all odds. This is her song.
"Things which are gone in the morning: sleep, darkness, grief, the moon. Women. Dreams.
"November sat cross-legged in her bedroom, a bare, white place she would never have thought to compare to her stacked hives but which nevertheless was a cousin to them, those sixteen calm, angular spaces.
On her lap was a wide blank book with rough-chewed edges, which she would never have thought to compare to her fingers, her thrice-dyed, badly cut hair, her chapped lips, but which nevertheless was a sister to these things: the woman, the raw flesh, the small white room. She was possessed of a self as bare as the month her parents met, the month of her own name, a core fashioned from stark wood and a prescience of snow."
lyrics
Things which are gone in the morning:
confidence, women, true stories, kisses
Things which I was not expecting:
maps which appear on the skin
maps which appear on my skin.
Glories as yet unpredicted:
gone for the list falls away from me now
(my dress, my sail)
stranger things surely have happened
to women I will not become
(this story will surely destroy me)
The city's heart sings a song for November
as she walks down to the shore
(a dim welcome hum, the thrum of a heartbeat)
Wrapped in blue, hideous heartbreak surrounds her
Will she come home after all?
Stranger things surely have happened:
turning my rings around, drifting on breezes
Home's close as dreaming
but I can't remember how
I can't remember
The city's heart sings a song for November
as she walks down to the shore
(a dim welcome hum, the thrum of a heartbeat)
Prophecies, honeybees swirling around her
treading her careful way home.
Choices are made and casualties counted
(air can make me meaningless)
Falling like pages
when a book hits the wall
(shut my lips upon the list)
Turning my rings around, drifting on breezes
waking or sleeping, which way do I go?
(before the morning ruins this)
An old-fashioned underground lurking nearby
(patiently waiting)
in a dream not a dream
are we open?
(you have been quartered)
Turn the world upside down
(I am no good)
Turning my rings around
(at expanding, contracting)
Nobody knows the way home
I know the way home!
ooh,
my dress, my sail
ooh, wonderful kisses
and maps which appear on the skin
Maps which appear on my skin
Oh,
The city's heart sings a song for November
as she walks down to the shore
(a dim welcome hum, the thrum of a heartbeat)
Prophecies, honey bees swirling around her
Nobody knows the way home
I know the way home!
ah,
(Confidence, women, true stories, kisses)
Glories as yet unpredicted
in maps which appear on the skin
maps which appear on my skin...hm.
Words and music copyright S. J. Tucker 2008, 2009; all rights reserved, all wrongs dissolved.
credits
from Quartered: Songs of Palimpsest,
track released February 24, 2009
Tracked on the road with the aid of Ginger Doss in Carla's lovely basement, Hendersonville, TN
Mixed by Ginger Doss, Eagle Audio, San Antonio, TX
Vocals and guitars by S. J. Tucker
Keys by Ginger Doss
“Without our songs and stories, we are nothing.” S. J. Tucker has been captain of her own music career since 2004, when she
left the workaday world behind to sing songs and change lives. Tucker is the voice of lore at the campfire and the sharp laughter of modern myth. With one hand anchored in her art and the other held out to us, she is songs and stories, community and wit....more
I would happily stroll the green with the Professor if the opportunity came. So very posh, and yet so very silly. Who wouldn't love a chap like this? He inspires me to parasol-rap of my own. <3 S. J. Tucker
Ginger (they, them) is my favorite recording engineer, bandmate, soulmate, and straight-up genius. This Cocoon is their first solo release. Favorite track: "Made It Home". I sang backup on "Masks" S. J. Tucker
Dogwood is the real deal: mythology, wit, whimsy, wisdom, and outstanding musical chops. Do please eat the pomegranate seeds so that you can stay a while and listen. S. J. Tucker