Well, what do you know?  Another druggy, droney song about death and tragic, transcendent love?  I want to point out that you hated this song when you first heard it (and you may still hate it now.  In fact, you may be skipping it on the playlist as we speak).  Afterall, it includes this gem of a line "When's this gonna end, how's it gonna be?  Immediate death or slow and painfully?" 

But didn't Shelley say much the same in these stanzas?:

III.
First our pleasures die—and then
Our hopes, and then our fears—and when
These are dead, the debt is due,
Dust claims dust—and we die too.

IV.
All things that we love and cherish,
Like ourselves must fade and perish;
Such is our rude mortal lot--
Love itself would, did they not.

If electric guitars and distortion pedals existed in the 19th century, you bet your sweet patoot that we would know Shelley by a song such as this. Now don't I seem smart?  And the song's pretty short, so suck it up Buttercup!

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This song really hit home when starting the drive home from my mom's nursing home on Sycamore Ave one ridiculously vacant night.  He was doing it live at the Primavera music festival in Spain and it was as if a knowing ghost was singing it just for me. 

I contend this is a song primarily about death (I know, shocker, stop the presses) but of course it’s about love as well (see every Romantic poet and at least half of the Modernists).

The funny thing of course is that the exact opposite was true for me.  It was precisely because I wasn't looking that love found me.  Just like me, that getting found can only come from not even realizing that I'm lost.  Fortunately I stumbled across a puppy that always knows her back way home.

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This song is a nod to the sadness that I feel for the sadness you must endure being yolked to a depressive.  And yes, I was initially inclined to say "manic depressive" there but, as usual, as usual, you are correct about this (happy?!).  The manic has indeed been slowly devoured by its tediously persistent and voracious cellmate.

The specific device here being the "Heard what you said, I heard what you said, on that day" describing those rare moments when an unvarnished truth is forced by sheer frustration from your lips.  And it's so suddenly obvious and unassailable  that the only rejoinder can be a silencing shame.   And as the floor drops out and I find myself falling, I know full well that I've pushed away the only thing in this world that I actually want to hang onto.  But what a drag to be a thing hung unto.  I’m so sorry for that weight.

And the “running from those eyes” device too. When we see ourselves through the eyes of our love, we usually get to see ourselves in the best possible light, as our most loveable selves.  I hope this is true.  I hope that you at least have glimpses of the terribly adorable creature - the cartoonishly sweet, whimsical, and devlishly smart creature that darts here and about my imaginings of you (ice cream cone sometimes, suddenly, in hand). But equally and oppositely “those eyes” have the power of complete negation.  These are the dangers of being truly seen. Or not being seen, in the instances where you see what you call my ‘wolf eyes’.

You will likely dislike this song at first hearing.  It's long, her voice is near atonal, droney, yadda, yadda - I can hear it already.  But give it 2-3 listens and at some point I'll hear you say ask me something like "what's that song with the pretentious girl that goes 'dah dah dah, something something, and when the light shines in my eyes, you know I'm thinking all the time..."  I’ve got it in my head."

And it should be.  It has a dramatic, cinematic quality that is the unmistakable, unmappable province of overwrought, over-sensitive youth world-round. And it's a song whose lyrics, in turns, summons us each to mind.  It’s a song about nail-biting for chrissakes.  And in her consideration of why she does it, these are her guesses:

"It's fear, it's guilt, it's envy
It's my self-destruct
When I feel like I'm stuck
And when the light shines in my eyes
You know I'm thinking all the time
But something happens when it gets too bright
And I lose my mind
And all these open lines
And this distraction gets me feeling bad
In my head I'm slow"

I imagine that might resonate a bit with someone who spends so much of her time under the fluorescent glare of a law office, where enough is never enough and what you sacrificed yesterday is merely a teaser, a trailer, for what's expected of you tomorrow.

And yes, I do sit around many days burying all the good things in my life before they’re even close to gone (“picking flowers for your grave”).  You, on the other hand are always rightly asking “who's in charge and who's getting paid”.  And yes, it is pretty obvious that "I'm not sure how to play the game" (albeit, I at least know when my taxes are due, even if I don’t happen to do them on time).  I could go on, but you be the judge.

It’s fitting that it ends on the recognition that self-evisceration ultimately guts more than oneself.  Lesson learned… so she says.

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There are a bunch of other songs that I could choose from this album (‘Happy Type’, ‘Look Alive’ and ‘But at the Same Time’ were close contenders, I really think you should check them out, I’ve put the album on your phone).  But this song recalls you in a way that is super special and visceral:  The whole body glimmer-glow sensation that would overtake me after those early nights when we were first falling in love.  The night at the train station, the choker necklace twist in the back of the car, the splendor in the freshly cut grass on the lawn with Dziadek’s car on the curb, et. al..

And to this day, to this moment, the thought of you stepping out of the elevator with Monk galloping toward you, brings that same hallowed glimmer-glow hum to my heart—

“I'm cracking jokes
Feeling the pulse of the party
We're coming up roses
Lightning bugs and half-done sketched-up songs
Nothing's wrong

Oh baby, in my mind of minds
I'm a notepad in your pocket
And in my life of lives
This is the best day I've ever had”

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I know my saturnine sensibilities can often give the impression that my lack of ardor for life is a lack of ardor for our love.  This couldn’t be less true.  Although I’m pretty sure I’m a short-timer in this place, if I had my druthers I would live an eternity with you.  You are the only thing worth keeping in this otherwise superfluous, disposable world. The astounding chance that I would find such a thing (and not (fully) crush it Lenny-style in my stupid, grubby hands) astounds me everyday.  You’re so very much just my kind— 

“so many summers have gone
so much that we've been through
don't you know that I'm just
getting started with you
don't you know you make me laugh when
I want to cry
but even more to the point is the fact
you're just my kind (just my kind)”

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Because my baby has a flare for the torch song, for the cinematic, the dramatic, the romantic.  You know, like that postcard that you got me that will probably never turn up again.  That’s OK. We have it mimeographed in our souls.

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Such a drama queen you are, Mr. Meritt.   In the face of the ineffable, words and music are all we really have.

“But you know you're the star of my life story
And I'm so sorry
Let the poets struggle to describe your heart
Your art of love and your love of art
Well, if you ever loved me
Tell me so
As you turn to go”

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The haunt of the music-box lullaby lures you in, and then the lyrics bring you to your knees.

“It was so clear to me
That it was almost invisible
I lie across the path waiting
Just for a chance to be
A spider web trapped in your lashes
For that, I would trade you my empire for ashes
But I choke it back, how much I need love”

If this flimsy, Happy Meal toy of a world ever gets melted and molded into something else - it will be by the furnace of the type of love we've shared in our lives.

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This is a super sappy song but that's fitting because despite the sheen of my impeccably composed, devil-may-care, hip, indifference, [ ;-) ] I love you in a super-sappy way.  And it specifically speaks to your question about whether I will ever lose my patience for my first and forever puppy.  So the next time you wonder on a scale of 1-10, how much I love you, here's my unambiguous answer, in (non-numerical) romantic song format.

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As you know, I’m contractually obligated to include at least one Syd Barrett penned song in my comp productions for you.  This one has that unmistakably ooey gooey dreamlike quality that I associate with falling in love with you in your chickenpocked flannel sheets and with whippet echoed deep voice profundities half whispered into the long dark summer night (and my blessed, blessed ear).

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This is a song to you about the teeth smashing terror of ever losing you.  Which of course I think about more and more as I move closer toward what Arundhati Roy refers to as a 'viable, die-able age'.  I'm sorry if it happens to me first.  You have every right to hate me.  I would you, on the bereft and blurred, final drive upstate.

“Why die? I don't understand it
I tried, but I feel dissatisfied
Why die? We never really said goodbye
I try, but I know you won't reply

I know now I have to be strong
I know now I have to move on

Dreams come to dreamers at night--
Tell of the sights you have seen
Silvery light of a dream
Saw you last night and you seemed
Lost in a dream...”

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John considered this song a 'throwaway' because it came so effortlessly to him.  And yes, it could do without the silly hoodoo guru faddish spiritual chanting part. But the ethereal quality of his voice here and the lushly smoothed symphonics summon to me those billowy, supernal moments between sleeping and waking when I feel you materialize beside me in bed. So many waking moments with you there – in our daily bed, in Hearthside’s breeze-kissed bed, beds that have tangled and untangled us, beds under stars and on sand.  And when I feel you a mere word, a mere arm’s length away, it is so often with the same startling relief: I have not lost you.  And so whatever the day’s waking moments may hold, they hold my love and in so doing, the world still matters.

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“I can't tell one from the other
I find you, or you find me?
There was a time before we were born
If someone asks, this is where I'll be, where I'll be oh!
We drift in and out
Oh! Sing into my mouth
Out of all those kinds of people
You got a face with a view”

What can be added to this?  Again, the effortless wonder of loving you.  This is as close to religion as I will ever get or ever need to ("there was time before we were born").  Being with you, in your arms, in your laughter, laughing.  ("Oh! Sing into my mouth")  Like a child dancing, like Monk's hello greeting.  It just happens and, suddenly, it's completely obvious what's good in the world.  And you’re dumbfounded that you hadn't seen it just a minute before.  The world opens up ("You got a face with a view").  And given what we know about the metrics of your face, that's a pretty panoramic view!  ;-)

See?  I'm an asshole but you can't help but laugh.

And that's why you're my Home.

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This is mostly here for our shared love of this scene and the perfect portrait of desperation it paints.  It's partly here as a mea culpa for my dark passenger ("I'm taking the cure so I can be quiet").  But you are no stranger to this.  And while you're the most upbeat sullen girl I've ever known, you're still a sullen girl.

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A perfect little song that really kills me.  It manages to get across the feeling of being untethered from you.  The terrible turning of the world inside out when our stars have lost their orbit.  And what it feels like when your sun comes out again.

“All my fears are water clear
When I'm not with you
All I hear is wicked dear
When I'm not with you

See how the sun shines like an arc
Where you walk”

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Beards
by The Dodos

This song goes into the 'Martha, My Dear' Hall of Fame.   All minor-chord deep and ponderous but probably about a guy who just can't grow good facial hair.  Or it's about shame and the complex social mechanism of 'a beard.'  Or it's about something else completely.  For me, it has deep resonance for the plaintive refrain "Don't look upon my face".  And for the only person in this world that I truly let do that.

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Caroline No
by The Beach Boys

Perhaps one of the saddest songs ever composed that doesn't last a second more than it should.  With dirge percussion and the pitch-perfect melody of ache.  That ends with the forlorn sound of a train departing and a dog barking (which always makes Monk bark when I play this loud enough).  This is about the death of personhood.  The way you can't imagine that someone has become the someone that they've become.  These are the eyes I see myself with everyday.  But never see you with. (Until you cut your hair of course; then all bets are off).  ;-)

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Life on Mars
by David Bowie

As you say, "it really paints a picture."  And now - for me - the picture it will always paint is only of you.  Spitting in the eyes of fools.  Getting sleepy-eyed at the film that's a saddening bore.  Wondering if he'll ever know.  If there's Life on Mars, I hope to find you there.  Again.  And again.

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Pitseleh
by Elliott Smith

"I'm not half what I wish I was
I'm so angry
I don't think it'll ever pass
And I was bad news for you just because
I never meant to hurt you"

'Nuff said.

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Anonymous Club
by Courtney Barnett

This is the story of a thousand beautiful nights spent with you.  The improbably rare quotidian wonder of you coming back home to me.  Care of a genius who can break love down into chords and notes and swell it back together into song.

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Better Days
by Graham Nash

Snatched it up immediately when you said you fancied it in the end credits of Hacks.  I may be just as attentive as Alexa, but 100% more forgetful after 15 minutes.

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I knew this song would eventually catch.  I've been seeding it forever.  Another song about the terror of losing you.  Sung from a very personal place for her and with a writ large overtone that couldn't be more timely.  "Oh god, are you listening to me now, I just can never forgive you for this deed you let go down."

Sifters
by Andrew Bird

"What if we hadn't been each other at the same time
Would you tell me all the stories from when you're young and in your prime
Would I rock you to sleep
Would you tell me all the secrets you don't need to keep
Would I still miss you
Or would you then have been mine

Sound is a wave like a wave on the ocean
Moon plays the ocean like a violin”

Yes, that is correct Mssr. Bird. Very much recalls the feeling of The Notebook for me and chilling notion that just by the idiot happenstance of arbitrary birth (or worse) we could be lost to each other forever. Just one more thing that beguiles but makes you appreciate the happenstance of luck that came our way.

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Ocean
by Velvet Underground

This is the best Syd Barrett song that Syd Barrett didn't write, particularly in this outtake of it.  This song is very movie soundtrack dramatic so I think you'll like it.  And it brings back to my ear a conversation we once had hiking on Monhegan (later, meagerly poemized).  We were talking about how the breathtaking, bone-wearing bigness of nature forces us to realize how ridiculously small we are.  Which can, as if by some kind of magic (some buttered, toasty little slice of satori),  make us feel so much less small.  And this is also how the whole can be greater than the sum of the parts it's made of.  Which, on our best days, is a lot like us.

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Beautiful Boy
by John Lennon

This song has had many permutations of meaning over the years. I certainly associate it with Milusz and Anjis but as of recently, it now sits in a different place for me.  It’s the song that rises to my mind’s ear in the seconds when I watch Monk’s eyes fix on me with happy recognition when I wake him from a bad dream and his whimpers fall away.  Our beautiful boy...

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You took a liking to this song and I didn’t see it coming.  I thought it could easily be a song that you would actively dislike in fact, and I love when that kind of turnaround happens. It may be influenced by the fact that the song has the line “I go to bakeries all day long” but I’m not fully 100% sure.  Oh, and also, I too am in love with the power that shows through in your eyes.

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A song about the longterm onset of depression in slow motion play by play.  The ‘slow change’ of decay that takes over when your primum mobile ceases to have a destination.  When it’s revealed that the long arc of history bends toward nothing other than obliviation and oblivion.  When ‘digging up the bones’ (e.g., group history) only yields dead things and there’s ‘nothing left to see’ (e.g.,  justifiably bleak ideological reckoning).

But the death of meaning doesn’t mean the death of beauty, art, love and magic.  This is a song that you can’t find the lyrics for online.  This is a band whose members were integral to all the bands that came out of the Elephant Six Collective (Neutral Milk, Of Montreal, Apples in Stereo, Olivia Tremor Control, etc.). This is a song we found by going to a live show.  See?  Wonders never cease and the world can always still surprise you.

And most jaw-dropping of all, none of this, not a single bit - despite the gravity of its truth, the complexity of its unfurling – can undo the leviathan fact of our love.   How utterly trite, right?  What a risible, unassailable triumph!  Well butter my ass and call me biscuit!  We managed to win in the most improbable way.  Deus ex machina in your face, bitches!  Of course we’ll crumble but we’ll crumble together.  And even when we’ve come to ruins, our ruins will hold a beauty (in the faded, cataracted, watery mind’s eye of the other) that will rival anything that’s come before or yet.  Thank you for this my love - thank you.

“I can feel it fading in
It’s coming close to me
Every second, every day, it’s all that I can see
And there was nothing else to show me
No there was nothing left to see
Later on the sun is gone
The shadows overgrown
Another year has left me here
Still digging up the bones
Tried to forget about the old ways
Tried to discover a new meaning
And always a slow change
Is coming over me
Finally now you turn around
Unhindered by the brain
The muscles move to pull you through to pull you through another day
And there was nothing else to show me
No there was nothing left to see
And always a slow change
Is coming over me”

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Once again, you ruin a surprise with your characteristically adorable ‘who me?’ innocence. 

A song that hammers home to me that our love transcends time.  Yes, when I hear it I’m  transported back to younger days but that same fluttering dearness carries forward to me kissing the nascent strands of gray on your head in the here and now.  The moment could be the same in either timeline because I’m the same crazy bee mad about the same somebody in both.  And yes, indeed, it’s as serious as can be.

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Lull
by Andrew Bird

Hot off the presses:  “This is the music for when we’re on Prince Edward Island together”.  Nothing can be added to that…

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Because you smell so good, even when you smell bad.  Your perfume is magic for me.  It’s like Monk’s musk.  It’s the smell of home.  You lift me up when I’m down, you pick me up off the ground.  Not all songs are literal of course, and clearly, it can be documented that you do not have “real long arms”.  But nonetheless you should hold me tight with them.  Forever.

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Slums
by Mount Moon

Almost feels like some grand stroke of fate that I came across this guy in the Subway just enough times to get his CD.  Feels like a million years ago.  And if you ask me what I miss about the city, these type of encounters jump unambiguously to mind.

There aren’t many songs that convey me in a way that this one does.  I’m not sure if I include it here by way of explanation or apology.  And though you certainly don’t need the former, sadly, I certainly owe you the latter…

“If I could only get my fill
never have to steal
but at this ripe age I'm full of holes
and days seep through me back to holy grounds
where I am not allowed

So like a fire in the woods
my eyes consume more than they should
I'm burning my way through rows of trees
learning next to nothing from all
these mistakes that I have made

So I sold my soul away at an early age
and I asked my teacher to teach me how to play
he said. "I'll do you one better, make you fuck it all up every
day, and there'll be truth in what you say"

And I'd like to be remembered as a saint
some great, unsinkable ship that sank
but nobody's ever gonna lay me down in different shades of paint
though they'll say, "Remember how much that boy drank"

So I sold my soul away at an early age
and I asked my teacher to teach me how to play
he said. "I'll do you one better, make you fuck it all up every
day, and there'll be truth when you're out there preaching all that

Pain," Oh no, no
Pain, oh no, no”

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Daydream
by The Lovin’ Spoonful

Leave it to John Sebastian to make a perfect love song about the importance of fucking off.  There is nothing more hallowed than a ‘snow day’ with my love, any day of the year.   Whether it be P.B.T. or ‘takin’ a walk outside’, there is no better way to spend the pittance of time we have in this life. And bonus points for the song having whistling!

“And even if time is passing me by a lot
I couldn't care less about the dues you say I got
Tomorrow I'll pay the dues for dropping my load
A pie in the face for being a sleepy bull dog

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Red Weather
by The Duke Spirit

Described to me once as “a really good drug song, you should put this on that comp.” Who knows if we ever get to that comp, so it’s on this comp.  In addition, this song rekindles for me the feeling of our courtship: that exquisite and indefinable ratio of attraction and intimidation.

“On and on
I'm excited by that noise
And I know my bedroom walls are loose
But the thing is that not one of you is right
Still I know if you impress me well I might”

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Sugar Mountain
by Neil Young

This came to us recently in Crip Camp.  Such a welcome reminder of the crushingly hopeful melancholy of early Neil Young.  It occurred to me while listening to this song with new, if older ears, that you and I live on Sugar Mountain.  Even though there’s still now, ironically, the teenage urge to run away, it’s clear that this is where I’ve longed for all my life.  And when I leave here, it will be grippingly clear that I’ll be ‘leavin' here too soon.’

“There's a girl just down the aisle
Oh to turn and see her smile
You can hear the words she wrote
As you read the hidden note

Oh to live on Sugar Mountain
With the barkers and the colored balloons
You can't be 20 on Sugar Mountain
Though you're thinking that
You're leavin' there too soon
You're leavin' there too soon”

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That I Do
by Wye Oak

I feel like this may have been on another comp.  Maybe.  It has so much weight for me that if falls through every floor I put it on.

“Better isn’t always doing well,
I know  because I’m better now myself...”

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This may be skipped over every time you listen to this thing.  But for the once or twice that you hear it through, it’s absolutely worth it.  The Mississippi river took this kid, which may have been the best outcome of the depressive overdetermination that comes from being sired by Tim Buckley.  Nonetheless, in a short time he managed to record an astounding album (Grace) and , IMHO, the best version of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”.  I’m not fully sure why that matters as much as it does to me, but it does.   It’s something about being so completely enveloped in something outside of yourself that the loss of yourself seems beside the point.

Just something about this song that led me to you in my mind.   It’s melodic and sweet and has this lyric which can’t help but make me think of you:

“Sung ‘Bird on a Wire’ but couldn’t recall the tune”

Yes, this is a very Marshis thing when it comes to describing or failing to describe music she likes.

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This is official payback for Death Cab for Cutie’s “I Will Follow You Into The Dark.”  Go ahead, I dare you not to cry…

She says, "Wake up, it's no use pretending"
I'll keep stealing, breathing her
Birds are leaving over autumn's ending
One of us will die inside these arms
Eyes wide open, naked as we came
One will spread our ashes around the yard
She says, "If I leave before you, darling
Don't you waste me in the ground"
I lay smiling like our sleeping children
One of us will die inside these arms
Eyes wide open, naked as we came
One will spread our ashes around the yard

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Heavy Storm
by First Aid Kit

The harmonies in this song manage to combine to split the listener in two.   A perfect recounting, by people too young to really know, about the uselessness of pining for any better time, past or future:

“We used to wait for our heavy storms
To take us away while something new would form
I wish that I could have known by then
We all know now that we're never getting back to those times”

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Almost seems like the beginning of a bad joke: “This paraplegic with Asperger’s walks into a recording studio…”

I appreciate the earnest inquiry about whether love is just codependency.  Maybe, but it occurs to me that I don’t really care.  It’s not the point.  It seems like the least interesting thing about love at this point.

“But I call this my home
And when we're alone
I don't want to go anywhere
And we go and watch
Waves crash into the rocks
And you take me there”

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Two Coffins
by Against Me

Partly here because the band is so compelling and partly here because how could I not include a song this morose and overdramatically romantic?  Quite frankly, I feel like I would not being doing my duty…

“How lucky I ever was to see,
The way that you smile at me,
Your little moon face shining bright at me
One day soon there'll be nothing left of you and me”

Did you notice the ‘moon face’ reference?  ;-)

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Julia
by The Beatles

The other bookend of the John / Paul White Album tribute to women that made an important impression on them.  Should be enough said there.  But obviously it isn’t.  John’s gonna win here on sheer emotional depth in both lyrics and sound, but Paul will not have to tote around the leaden corpse of his dead mommy issues to every party he goes to for the rest of his life.  Much more attractive to the chicks.  But John gets to find real love with a woman who can actually see him and whom he can actually see (even in the dark). 

I’m with John.

Julia, seashell eyes
Windy smile calls me
So I sing the song of love
Julia

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Crystal Gazing
by Be Bop Deluxe

When I was a teen I was blown away by how romantic this song was.  It seems only fitting that at 50, 28 years into sharing my life with the love of my life, that I would reveal that it still chokes me up (knowing how goddamn corny it is!)

“And the moon through the window of the bedroom
Where lovers slumbered
Made a silver dance of such dust beneath the bed...
And I waited for a moment in the lamplight,
Crystal gazing
Listening to their hearts
And the changing of their breath.
Listening to their hearts
And the changing of their breath.”

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Noland
by Sloppy Heads

I just love the sound of this retro gem and the sly humor of the lyrics. Thought you might enjoy the faux-heartthrobby drama of the whole thing and couldn’t think of a better way to get it to your  ears.

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Sunny
by Bobby Hebb

Nothing needs to be added to the lyrics, vocals, horns and bright, gleaming percussion in this song.  I’d like to think that it’s personal to me but the truth is that you’re everyone’s ‘Sunny’.  From the people in your family, to the people you work with, to the strangers (aside from cab drivers), that intersect with you daily. You’re just one of those bastard, good natured, sweet people who put the rest of us to shame.  And you know what, FUCK YOU! ;-)

“Sunny, thank you for that smile upon your face
Sunny, thank you, thank you for the gleam that flows its grace
You're my spark of nature's fire
You're my sweet complete desire
Sunny one so true, yes, I love you”

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Calverton
by Julie Ruin

Wait, another song about death and love?  How can?

This song might be too terribly earnest.  I really don’t know anymore.  But I’m thoroughly willing to forgive that, if nothing else than as a GIANT fuck you to the smirk-sure purveyors of its opposite.  Eat my ass you pathetic persecutors of the pathetic.  Our makeup may be a terrible mess but every tear was worth it.

“I can't stop thinking about the sun
And where we go when we're no one”

Without you I might be numb
Hiding in my apartment from everyone
Without you I'd take the fifth
Or be on my death bed still full of wishes
But you, made me think that I could fly
You, made me think that I could fly”

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You’ve mentioned that you like this song a few times and I just wanted to capture this somewhere where you’ll have it when I’m dead.  Happy?

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Candy Says
by Velvet Underground

Another hot off the presses situation here with your recent declaration, upon actually hearing the first lines of this song, that it "was a really good line."  Yes.  Mr. Reed is happy you approve. 

Me too.  Because it’s a song that probably conveys more about me than I ever could.  What would I see of myself, if I could ever walk away from me?  Call me Candy Cuttita.  I’ll include the full lyrics here in case you, by chance, find any other noteworthy lines…
 
“Candy says I've come to hate my body
And all that it requires in this world
Candy says I'd like to know completely
What others so discretely talk about

I'm gonna watch the blue birds fly over my shoulder
I'm gonna watch them pass me by
Maybe when I'm older
What do you think I'd see
If I could walk away from me

Candy says I hate the quiet places
That cause the smallest taste of what will be
Candy says I hate the big decisions
That cause endless revisions in my mind

I'm gonna watch the blue birds fly over my shoulder
I'm gonna watch them pass me by
Maybe when I'm older
What do you think I'd see
If I could walk away from me.”

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Talk Talk
by Music Machine

Although this is not “Talk Talk” by the band “Talk Talk” off their album “Best of Talk Talk” as Terri Tolenko aptly announced to our shared glee.  It is the far superior, obscure original by Music Machine.   Few things in the world better than the combo of these three things: 1) In a car 2) Radio loud 3) Being with you.

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One of your “I can’t remember which song it is, but it goes like this…” Marshis Especials.  And it’s tres schmaltzy and bomantic and true.  You’re literally too good to be true.

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Black Hearted Boy
by Fiery Furnaces

Since I am indeed your Black Hearted Boy, I couldn’t resist the urge to include this.  But knowing how much you dislike the jarring, spiky bits of this song, I manually edited them out.  That’s how much I love you and how NOT black my heart is for you!

“Darling black-hearted boy,
All the color's gone out of my ribbon loom,
As I've only got the worst to assume,
Take your sheet metal sheers,
Cut a slit up the side of my dark blue dress,
For a last time lie your love confess”

Editor’s Note: This song was edited for brevity and taste.

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Yes, as you’ve pointed out this came from Paul’s brief but productive ‘Lisp Period.’  The original, “Marsha, My Dear” was even more romantic and about an even better puppy.  I like to think that some of Paul’s outsized fortune gets trickled down on me whenever I see and hear you sing along to this song.  Don't forget me, Marsha, my dear.

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Tereza and Tomas
by Bright Eyes

This sits in the same lockbox with Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day”, Radiohead’s “Exit Music”,  and Eliot Smith’s “Needle in the Hay”.  But I submit that this can be viewed through different eyes. Tereza and Tomas, like Terry and Julie, only need each other and their Waterloo Sunset to find paradise.  I know a little something about that.

“Leave the photos in the drawer, my love
We no longer need them
We both know where we've been
Let's sail away disappearing in a mist
Let's sail away with a whisper and a kiss
Or vanish from a road somewhere, like tereza and tomas,
Suspended in this bliss.”

Editor’s Note: This song was edited for brevity and taste.

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Groovin'
by The Rascals

From one little brother to one little sister.  Despite being full-on front-seat people now, you’ll always be my wide-eyed little Leslie in the backseat along for the ride.

“I can't imagine anything that's better
The world is ours whenever we're together
There ain't a place I'd like to be instead of”

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Demerol
by Hannah Marcus

For all the souls we watched rise from that bed.   For the terror of one day being another one. For the way the ceiling became a celestial vista in my Dad’s slouced, morphine-kissed eyes. 

If I tell you there’s a paradise, please believe me--

“What have I missed?
I’ve never seen a ceiling
quite like this before
How many souls have risen from
this bed?
What are these hands?
If they cannot touch
the things they love
Tell me nurse,
what happens to the dead?

I was driving down the highway
with my eyes closed
when suddenly I felt this pain
inside
Now if I tell you there’s a paradise,
you must believe me
Even if it’s just the fluorescent lights”