Monthly Archives: March 2008

Broken, Too

Broken, Too
new song alert

The girl sat sobbing in the shadow of the battered penthouse shed. He tried to catch his breath, bent over, his hands on his knees but keeping a wary eye on the girl, her legs sprawled outward beneath her.

She looked up at him, her face contorted and tears streaming down it. There was bottomless pleading in her eyes. He thought of all the frightened animals he had seen across the years and looked beyond her for just a moment to the darkened city beneath them.

Her sobbing slowed and he stiffened, readying himself.

He’d barely pulled her back from the edge the last time.

He considered socking her in the jaw, like they do in the movies but he’d never socked anyone in the jaw and he figured the one thing you could count on in real life was that violence is never the same as in the movies. He figured that either the blow would kill her or give her brain damage — or just make her crazier and harder to control.

He’d chased her to the roof of the old 12 story apartment house, a few paces behind her. She’d hesitated on the ledge and he grabbed her arm, hurling her back away from the edge of the roof.

For an impossible amount of time they had struggled. He tried to drag her to the doorway but it was impossible to get her through and down the stairs. In time her struggle against him turned into wracking sobs, her shoulders heaving. He pushed her down against the penthouse and tried to speak soothingly to her. She seemed oblivious to him.

And then she bolted for the edge.

He caught her as she scrambled up onto the ledge, cutting her bare arm on the exposed masonry. He could smell the blood that glistened on her arm and the ocean but all he could see was her against the night sky and all he could hear was his own blood pounding in his ears.

She was standing, swaying. The full moon seemed a distant observer. It should have looked huge, hovering above the horizon — but it looked tiny and far, far away.

For a moment he was frozen — then his mind went completely blank and he just grabbed her. He thought they were both dead.

But they weren’t.

Not this time.

Broken, Too

I want to help you, baby
but I just don’t know what to do

I tried to love you, baby
but I just couldn’t think for two

I thought I could save you
I thought love might pull us through

I thought I could fix things
but I found out I’m broken, too

I thought I could fix things
but I found out I’m broken, too

I want to help you baby
but I just don’t know what to do

I thought I could fix things
but I found out I’m broken, too

I thought I could fix things
but I found out I’m broken, too

(C)2008, TK Major

Share

Near London Bridge

Near London Bridge

Tower Bridge, near London Bridge

He was moping in a pub near the boring, real London Bridge and he finally stumbled out into the slanting daylight late in the afternoon.

His girlfriend, scratch that, ex-girlfriend, had flown back to LA the day before, leaving him with a half deck of traveler’s checks, some of her underwear and nylons (overflow from her own overlarge suitcases that she’d stuffed in his much smaller case) and a digital camera full of pictures of said ex-girlfriend posing in front of a series of British landmarks.

Near London Bridge

more stream & DL options

mandolin and guitar


This slip of an improvisation came about as a result of the combination of my recent return to the drone style tuning I was using earlier this year with my continued plinking on my new 50 dollar mandolin.

The title came about when I stumbled onto a bit of the melody from the old London Bridge is falling down nursery rhyme. (Which is the only way I ever play any recognizable melody… heaven knows if I tried I couldn’t do it… my brain simply doesn’t work like that.)

Anyway, I thought this wasn’t entirely without charm…

She managed a jaunty smile in the early snaps, but by the end of the series, any pretense of pleasure or even patience had plainly left her face and in the last few pics, she was giving him that look. He snapped the picture just before she raised her finger at him from in front of the British Museum. After that, he didn’t take any more pictures. After that, it was only a matter of time before one or the both of them left early. Neither of them had enjoyed much since the first few nights — but he was determined that somehow, with her gone, he would. Waiting her out wasn’t that difficult. He kissed her on the cheek at the airport, leaving her in a waiting area long before boarding.

Outside the pub, he decided to walk along toward the Tower Bridge. When he got there, he wandered around the tiny marina off St Katharine’s Way. It was starting to drift into darkness and as he walked across the Tower Bridge, the lights were on and just starting to shimmer in the river.

At first, all he saw of the girl was her eyes — even though she was 15 feet away and gathering dusk should have dimmed the light reflected in them. Maybe they picked up the last light from the sky. They glowed with a deep, green glow. Like he imagined an emerald must look. Her hair was dark and reddish brown, freckles across her cheeks. She was looking past him but as she neared him, in the last few feet before they passed each other, her eyes moved to meet his.

Consciously, he began to look away but just as his eyes began to dart to the side, he looked again — and fell, like a lost boy down a well, into her eyes. For a moment he was in free fall. It wasn’t even a full second but it seemed to go on forever as his heart pounded slowly in his ears. At the last instant, just before she passed him, she smiled, a faint, shy, schoolgirl’s smile.

It was too late for him to smile and, for a moment, he walked, his gaze frozen forward. Then, as casually as he possibly could, in the most offhand manner manageable by a man whose heart was beating like he’d just turned in his best ever 100 meter dash, he looked back over his shoulder.

The sky was darkening and clouds, lit from behind, were stacking up across a deep blue sky, lights coming on, and flooding the century old bridge. On the walkway, the pedestrians quickened their pace a little. But the girl with the green eyes walked, not quite slowly, into the crowd and the darkness on the other side. Maybe she had turned to look back over her own shoulder at him in those first moments after they’d passed — while he had stared mutely forward in disbelief. If she had, he’d never know. But, as he watched her disappear on the other shore, she never looked back.

Near London Bridge
download [ 1.1 mb] vbr mp3
play [broadband]
AYoS radio [broadband]
more stream & DL options

Near London Bridge
instrumental
(C)2008, TK Major

Share

Christine in a cafe with the boulevardiers…

Christine in Paris

 

He met her in a cafe near Montmartre. But he knew her slightly from back home; she’d been in one of his classes. He’d never talked to her, but he’d often noticed her, usually laughing at the center of a knot of young men.

At first, he didn’t recognize her, only saw the back of her head in the cafe, barely noticing the jet black bob of shiny hair. But one of the three men with her at the table kept staring at him. For a while he thought there would be trouble — the young man’s gaze was so intent. Finally, the man walked over.

“You’re from New York?”

“No,” he said, trying to size the guy up. Suddenly, he realized the man was probably gay. He spoke English with the adopted cadence of someone signaling a certain delicacy of spirit.

“My friend,” the man continued, “She thinks she knows you.”

The girl had turned around, a faint, quizzical smile on her face. Then he knew who it was. “I’m not from New York. But I do know your friend, I think. We went to college together.”

He joined them at their table and, after a while, the men left, and he was alone with her.

It was Paris. And she was beautiful.

Neither of them were what you would call free, it turned out, but with their encumbrances half a world away, it was easy enough to give in to the moment.

And the moment gave way to a series of afternoons and evenings and long nights talking and drinking and walking through the streets and along the river. Paris can draw out a moment like that… draw it out into reveries and dreams…

Instead of renting a car and driving by himself to Italy, as he’d long planned, he found himself with the girl, driving along the northern coast.

When they got to St. Malo a series of storms blew in off the North Atlantic, rolling in over the dark walls of the old city and hammering the ancient, rippled windows of the tiny upstairs room in the pension they found, keeping them there for days.

Or maybe they kept each other there. The first morning, he walked out during a break in the rain and bought a small bag of groceries, a loaf of bread, cheese, two bottles of local wine.

He told himself he wasn’t falling in love.

Back home, back on the job after his first real vacation from his first real, career job… he found himself daydreaming about her constantly. She was still in France, in a graduate program oriented to rich Americans, studying post-deconstructionalist, neo-Marxist film criticism. Or something. It seemed to change with every letter.

He dreamed of her and walking by the Seine… or the long days in the little pension in St. Malo.

But she wrote of school, gossiped about her gay male friends and their businessmen boyfriends, made small talk.

He could feel the distance grow. With every letter, she drew farther away.

A lot farther than just the distance from L.A. to Paris…

 

Too Much Trouble Christine

more stream & DL options

previous versions
Monday, October 17, 2005
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
Tuesday, January 31, 2006

new ‘studio’ recording

lyrics
Too Much Trouble Christine

You’re too much trouble, Christine
You’re too much trouble, Christine
You’re too much trouble, Christine
So Why do I love you, Christine

You’re too much trouble, Christine

Christine on a beach, Christine on a plane
Christine in a cafe with the boulevardiers
Christine on the set Christine in my head
Christine in my heart and tearing up my bed

You’re too much trouble, Christine…

Christine I’m terrified just holding your hand
Christine you twist me up like no one else can
Christine you’re crazy but you got a plan
world domination begins with one man

You’re too much trouble, Christine
You’re too much trouble, Christine
You’re too much trouble, Christine
So Why do I love you, Christine

You’re too much trouble, Christine

(C)2008, TK Major

Share