MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Quittin’ Time

Hey baby tell me what we’re gonna do
It’s getting crazy and I need some help from you
We were so connected that you were a part of me
Now I feel an emptiness right to the heart of me

But you pretend and I pretend
That everything is fine
And though we should be at an end
It’s so hard admittin’
When it’s quittin’ time

Hey baby I’m running out of things to say
Please don’t hate me this feeling just won’t go away
Now we’re spending all our time caught in a fantasy
Just trying to keep in mind the way it used to be

But you pretend and I pretend
That everything is fine
And though we should be at an end
It’s so hard admittin’
When it’s quittin’ time

But you pretend and I pretend
That everything is fine
And though we should be at an end
It’s so hard admittin’
When it’s quittin’ time

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Where Time Stands Still

Baby where’s that place where time stands still
I remember like a lover can
But I forget it like a leaver will
It’s no place you can get to by yourself
You’ve got to love someone and they love you
Time will stop for nothing else
And memory plays tricks on us, the more we cling,
The less we trust
And the less we trust the more we hurt
And as time goes on it just gets worse
So baby where’s that place where time stood still
It is under glass inside a frame
Was it over when you had your fill

And here we are with nothing but
But this emptiness inside of us
Your smile a fitting, final gesture
Wish I could have loved you better

Baby where’s that place where time stands still
I remember like a lover can
But I forget it like a leaver will
It’s the first time that you held my had
It’s the smell and the taste and the fear and the thrill
It’s everything I understand
And all the things I never will

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – What To Keep And What To Throw Away

These are your instructions
Should you choose to follow
Sit down with pen and paper
Begin with something hollow
Like the last words that he offered
No kind of explanation
They only take up space here
You do not need to save them

Open up the closet
Find his winter coat there
Check inside the pockets
Find a crumpled note there
It says “milk and Sunday paper”
And a heart smudged in blue ink
Fold it up and box it before you’ve time to think

Sundays are the hardest
Avoid familiar back roads
Erase the old phone numbers
Delete all the photos
And those you haven’t heard from
Will come as no surprise
They made their calculation
When they chose a side

These are your instructions
When you become reclusive
When old friends say they miss you
When sleep becomes elusive
Fill up every journal
Empty every shoebox
Burn the lists and letters
Sweep out all the old thoughts
Shake off all the covers
Throw every window open
Stand here in your bare feet
Welcome in the morning
These are your instructions
When grace has left you stranded
When you are lost and wounded
Bleeding and abandoned

Use a tourniquet for pressure
Let time do it’s healing
Say prayers for good measure
When you think you’ve lost all feeling
Now walk into the guest room
The last place he was sleeping
See the outline on the pillow
Smooth it without weeping

One last final walk through
Now move the bags and boxes
From front porch onto back seat
Haul away the losses
These are your instructions
If you choose to follow
Stop and take a big breath
Begin with something hollow…

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Transcendental Reunion

From 20,000 feet
I saw the lights below me
Twinkling just like Christmas
We descended slowly

And the curve of the world passed
With all of that flying
Above the mighty ocean
And now we all are arriving

Grab the carry on baggage
Join the herd for the mad run
Take a place in the long line
Where does every one come from?

As we shuffle on forward
As we wait for inspection
Don’t be holding that line up
At the end lies redemption
Oh Oh, Hey Hey, Ah Ah

Now I’m stamped and I’m waved through
I take up my position
At the mouth of the cannon
Saying prayers of contrition

Please deliver my suitcase
From all mischief and peril
Now the sight of it circling
Is a hymn to the faithful

Forgive me for my staring, for my unconcealed envy
In the Hall of Arrivals where the great river empties

It’s hand carts and porters
All the people it carries
To be greeted with flowers
Grandfathers and babies
Oh Oh, Hey Hey, Ah Ah

There is no one to meet me
Yet I’m all but surrounded
By the tears and embracing
By the joy unbounded

The friends and relations
Leaping over hemispheres
Transcendental reunion
All borders vanish here

We are travelers traveling
We are gypsies together
We’re philosophers gathering
We are business or pleasure

We are going or coming
We’re just finding our way
To the next destination
And from night into day
Oh Oh, Hey Hey, Ah Ah,
Oh Oh, Hey Hey, Ah Ah

In a giant bird’s belly
I flew over the ocean
From 20,000 feet high
How those lights were glowing

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – The Swords We Carried

Back when I believed in luck
And stones & crosses
I’d put a coin found on the street
Towards cosmic losses
And passing graveyards in a car
Tracing every falling star
Luck was never very far from childhood causes

And pennies kissed with wishes arced into the fountains
And time was said to heal all pain
And hope move mountains
And all that could befall a heart
Or break this perfect life apart
The swords we carried could not do a thing about them
Away I am going, away I am gone

Ghosts and angels are but memories and visions
And revenants are out there taking up positions
But back when I believed in you
You’d raise the sun and set the moon
How could I help but love you holy as religion
Away you are going, away you are gone

But back when I believed in luck and words as spoken
I found a lie could break and split the world clean open
And grief became my company
Pain so deep I could not breathe
All betrayal is like dying in slow motion

Is it luck that makes us shout or makes us whisper
Is it luck that makes us wise or turns us bitter
With our maps that point true north
With our vows we sally forth
The swords we carried can’t protect us from eachother
Away we are going
Away we are gone
Away we are going
Away we are gone

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Soul Companion

All of our dreams are laid out and measured
Arrows and pins and a rainbow of threads
Like hope on a string, sewn into the linings
For the courage to face the unknown ahead

My soul companion
Out in the world somewhere
My soul companion
I’ll meet you there

I’m packing my compass, trusted and tested
My dog-eared maps to study and fold
Into a pocket, I’m traveling light now
All that we have is all that we hold

My soul companion
In my heart you are
My soul companion
Just like a star

There are no borders, there are no boundaries
There are no fences up around me
But I get quiet and I get lonely
Just like everyone

These are the old roads, these are the stations
I look for my ride, you wait for your train
These are the chances, a life’s incantations
These are the places that don’t know our names

My soul companion
Love finds its own way in
My soul companion
Now let us begin
My soul companion
Out in the world somewhere
My soul companion
I’ll meet you there

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Once In Royal David’s City

Once in royal David’s city,
Stood a lowly cattle shed,
Where a mother laid her baby
In a manger for His bed:
Mary was that mother mild,
Jesus Christ her little child.

He came down to earth from heaven,
Who is God and Lord of all,
And His shelter was a stable,
And His cradle was a stall;
With the poor and meek and lowly,
Lived on earth our Savior holy.

And through all
His wondrous childhood,
He would honor and obey,
Love and watch the lowly mother,
In whose gentle arms He lay.
Christian children all should be,
Mild, obedient, good as He.

For He is our child-hood’s pattern,
Day by day like us He grew,
He was little, weak, and helpless,
Tears and smiles like us He knew,
And He feeleth for our sadness,
And He shareth in our gladness.

And our eyes at last shall see Him,
Through His own redeeming love;
For that child so dear and gentle,
Is our Lord in heaven above,
And He leads His children on,
To the place where He is gone.

Not in that poor lowly stable,
With the oxen standing by,
We shall see Him, but in heaven,
Set at God’s right hand on high;
When like stars
His children crowned,
All in white shall be around.

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Old Love

I want old love, the kind that takes years
To turn to gold, love, burnished and seared
On the high wire, by rain, wind and sun
With the hard times forgiven and done

I want old love, the kind that seeps in
It isn’t cold, love, it’s never brittle or thin
It’s the long kiss, it’s the curl of a sigh
Down a hallway, in the middle of the night

I want old love, the kind that can see
Through the holes, love, that live underneath
All our false cheer, bravado and pride
Through the old fears we carry inside

I want old love, the kind that can say
What it knows, love, and what it learned on the way
In that one voice, familiar and strange
Only old love remembers your name

I want old love, the kind that holds on
When it’s told, love, that all hope is gone
Against all odds, wagers and prayers
To the wall love, to the furthest somewhere

I want old love, the kind that takes years
To turn to gold, love, burnished and seared
On the high wire, by rain, wind and sun
With the hard times forgiven and done

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – New Year’s Day

We are sitting at a table in a bar in Baltimore
It’s the last night of December
And the room is nearly full
And the front door pulls a draft in every time it opens wide
And you are telling me a story
From another time and life

And the waitress brings our order
And we’re tucked in mighty close
And I feel like we belong among
The living and these ghosts
And I know that I am dreaming
As I memorize each part
In the telling lies a reverie
In the details lie the heart

Like the folds of summer dresses
Like the scent upon my wrist
Like the way you played guitar
Like a boxer punches with his fist
And taken or just lost to me
It’s better now to say
I dwell in possibility
On New Year’s Day

There’s a jukebox or a bandstand
And we’re on another round
And the night’s just getting started
Or the night’s just winding down
And your stories are not clouded yet by the ale
Or by the gin
They just make me feel as if I’ve known you
All my life again

Like the folds of summer dresses
Like the scent upon my wrist
Like the way you played guitar
Like a boxer punches with his fist
And taken or just lost to me
It’s better now to say
I dwell in possibility
On New Year’s Day

And this is what it looked like
When we started walking home
The night sky bleached to silver
Against the city’s bones
In dreams or in our waking
It’s just enough to say
Love and grace and endless flowers
Be ours on New Year’s Day

And the folds of summer dresses
And the bangles on my wrist
And the way you played guitar
Like a boxer punches with his fist
And taken or just lost to us
It’s better now to say
We dwell in possibility
On New Year’s Day

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – My Heaven

Nothing shatters
Nothing brakes
Nothing hurts
Nothing aches
We got ourself one hell of a place

In my heaven

Looking down at the world below
A bunch of wine
Fighting schmoos
Up here we got none of those

In my heaven

Theres pools and lakes and hills and mountains
Music, art, lighted fountains
Who needs bucks here, no ones counting

In my heaven

No one works, we all just play
You can pick the weather everyday
And if you change your mind thats ok

In my heaven

Grandmas up here grandpa too
In a condo with “to die for” view
There’s president and movie stars
You just come as you are

No one’s lost and no one’s missing
No more partings, just hugs and kissing
And all these stars are just for wishing

In my heaven

Theres little white lights every where
Your childhood dog in dads old chair
And more memorys than then my heart can hold
Leave us singing fields of gold
Theres neighbors, theives and long lost lovers
Villians, poets, kings and mothers
Up here we forgive each other

In my heaven

For every soul thats down there waiting
Holding on still hesitating
We say a prayer of levitating

In my heaven

You can look back on your life and lot
It can’t matter what your not
By the time your here were all we’ve got

In my heaven
In my heaven
In my heaven

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Learning The World

Grief rides quietly on the passenger side
Unwanted company on a long, long drive
It turns down the quiet songs and turns up the din
It goes where you go, it’s been where you’ve been

And pushing your empty cart mile after mile
Leaves you weeping in the wilderness
Of the supermarket aisle
And in the late night kitchen light it sits in a chair
Watching you pretend that it’s not really there

But it is, so it is and you ask
Are you predator or friend
The future or the past?

It hands you your overcoat and opens the door
You are learning the world again just as before
But the first time was childhood
And now you are grown
Broken wide open, cut to the bone

And all that you used to know is of no use at all
The same eyes you’ve always had have you walking into walls
And the same heart can’t understand
Why it’s so hard to feel
What used to be true
What’s now so unreal

But it is, so it is and you say
I wish I were the wind so that I could blow away

Grief sits silently on the edge of your bed
It’s closing your eyes, it’s stroking your head
The dear old companion is taking up air
Watching you pretend that it’s not really there

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Late For Your Life

You’ve been saying for the longest time that the time has come
You’ve been talking like you’re of a mind to get some changing done
Maybe move out of the city, find some quiet little town
Where you can sit out on your back porch step
And watch the sun go down
No one knows where they belong
The search just goes on and on and on
For every choice that ends up wrong
Another one’s right
A change of scene would sure be great
The thought is nice to contemplate
But the question begs why would you wait
And be late for your life

Now you might never find that perfect town
But the sun still sets on a rooftop where the city
Sounds like a Gershwin clarinet
And you might still be searching every face for one you can’t forget
Love is out there in a stranger’s clothes
You just haven’t met him yet
No one knows where they belong
The search just goes on and on and on
For every day that ends up wrong
Another one’s right
Call it chance or call it fate
Either one is cause to celebrate
Still the question begs why would you wait
And be late for your life

Call it chance baby, call it fate
Either one is cause to celebrate
And the question now is why would you wait
Don’t be late for your life

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Jericho

You can’t see me yet
Seeing takes a long, long time
From the outside in
Measuring each shift and sigh

But as you let your eyes adjust
To the darkness deep within
Sifting through the ash and dust
We are the places that we’ve been

You can’t hear me yet
Listening takes a long, long time
And I’ve so much to tell
But words die on these lips of mine

But in the stillness you may sense
Every thing I long to say
Unraveling like golden threads
The walls will all come down this way

You don’t know me yet
Knowing takes a long, long time
And time is all we have
Never traveling in straight lines

So memorize each turn and twist
Just be careful as you go
For if love is a labyrinth
Then my heart is Jericho

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – I Tried Going West

I tried going west where the sky meets the sun
Where the edge of the world’s always been
As far from this place as a girl gets to run
When her reasons to stay have worn thin

Out there the days were so bright and so blue
Yet I missed all my thunder and rain
The way a storm punctures a hot afternoon
Washing away every stain

When my maps pointed north they were calling for snow
To cover all sound and all sight
Tell me where on this earth does all that noise go
Underneath all of that white

With thaws scarcely mentioned I dug out my truck
By the time the storm cleared I was gone
Back on the road with the radio up
Singing at the top of my lungs

Driving and crying and driving some more
Oh the south is a good place to hide
Hot nights, cold beer and creaky screen doors
And a motel’s vacancy sign

A letter a day I wrote back home to you
But not one you ever received
Because I can’t stand a man who lies like you do
And I can’t bear a woman who pleads

One day it dawned I had run out of road
And out of reasons to run
Like a horse to the barn I was hell bent to go
As fast going back as I’d come

Home, home was the song that I sang
As I pulled in just before dark
There was only a hook where your coat used to hang
That’s where I hung up my heart

I tried going west, where the sky meets the sun

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – I Am A Town

I’m a town in Carolina, I’m a detour on a ride
For aphone call and a soda, I’m a blur from the driver’s side
I’m the last gas for an hour if you’re going twenty-five
I am Texaco and tobacco, I am dust you leave behind

I am peaches in September, and corn from a roadside stall
I’m the language of the natives, I’m a cadence and a drawl
I’m the pines behind the graveyard, and the cool beneath their shade, where the boys have left their beer cans
I am weeds between the graves.

My porches sag and lean with old black men and children
Their sleep is filled with dreams, I never can fulfill them
I am a town.

I am a church beside the highway where the ditches never drain
I’m a Baptist like my daddy, and Jesus knows my name
I am memory and stillness, I am lonely in old age; I am not your destination
I am clinging to my ways
I am a town.

I’m a town in Carolina, I am billboards in the fields
I’m an old truck up on cinder blocks, missing all my wheels
I am Pabst Blue Ribbon, American, and “Southern Serves the South”
I am tucked behind the Jaycees sign, on the rural route
I am a town
I am a town
I am a town
Southbound.

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – He Thinks He’ll Keep Her

She makes his coffee, she makes his bed
She does the laundry, she keeps him fed
When she was twenty-one she wore her mother’s lace
She said “forever” with a smile upon her face
She does the car-pool, she PTAs
Doctors and dentists, she drives all day
When she was twenty-nine she delivered number three
And every Christmas card showed a perfect family
Everything runs right on time, years of practice and design
Spit and polish till it shines. He thinks he’ll keep her
Everything is so benign, safest place you’ll ever find
God forbid you change your mind. He thinks he’ll keep her
She packs his suitcase, she sits and waits
With no expression upon her face
When she was thirty-six she met him at their door
She said I’m sorry, I don’t love you anymore
Everything runs right on time, years of practice and design
Spit and polish till it shines. He thinks he’ll keep her
Everything is so benign, safest place you’ll ever find
God forbid you change your mind. He thinks he’ll keep her
For fifteen years she had a job and not one raise in pay
Now she’s in the typing pool at minimum wage
Everything runs right on time, years of practice and design
Spit and polish till it shines. He thinks he’ll keep her
Everything is so benign, safest place you’ll ever find
At least until you change your mind. He thinks he’ll keep her

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Hero In Your Own Hometown

We were born during the boom times, played house down in the bomb shelter
Suffered through the wonder years, and silence at the dinner hour
But once upon a summertime, out behind the old garage
We were buzzing on midnight, Luckys and Rolling Rock
Thinking we were heroes in our own hometown
Nothing less than heroes in that old hometown

Some married on a day in June, some disappeared without a trace
And some of us are still at large, still searching for a better place
But once upon another time, it didn’t matter what they said
Didn’t matter if we fell behind, we’d still come out ahead
Cause we believed in heroes in that old hometown
Hey, you could be a hero in your own hometown

Now I’m long away and very far, from gazing at an evening sky
From wishing on a shooting star, from thinking that a heart can’t lie
This world is gonna wear you thin, knot you up and spin you round
This world will take it’s aim, call you every name, trying to bring you down

Everything seems so clear when you’re looking back from such a distance
When the road not taken disappears into the path of least resistance
But once upon a time oh so long ago
Underneath this same old sky every brand new road

Would know that we were heroes in our own hometown
Nothing less than heroes in that old hometown
We still loved a hero in our own hometown
Baby you could be a hero in your own hometown

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Halley Came To Jackson

Late one night when the wind was still
Daddy brought the baby to the window sill
To see a bit of heaven shoot across the sky
The one and only time Daddy saw it fly

It came from the east just as bright as a torch
The neighbors had a party on their porch
Daddy rocked the baby, Mother said “amen”
When Halley came to visit in nineteen ten

Now back then Jackson was a real small town
And it’s not every night a comet comes around
It was almost eighty years since its last time through
So I bet your mother would’ve said “amen” too

As its tail stretched out like a stardust streak
The papers wrote about it every day for a week
They wondered where it’s going and where it’s been
When Halley came to Jackson in 1910

Now Daddy told the baby sleeping in his arms
To dream a little dream of a comet’s charms
And he made a little wish as she slept so sound
In nineteen eighty-six that wish came ’round

It came from the east, just as bright as a torch
She saw it in the sky from her daddy’s porch
As heavenly sent as it was back then
When Halley came to Jackson in nineteen ten
Late one night when the wind was still

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – The Moon And St. Christopher

When I was young I spoke like a child, and I saw with a child’s eyes
And an open door was to a girl like the stars are to the sky
It’s funny how the world lives up to all your expectations
With adventures for the stout of heart, and the lure of the open spaces

There’s 2 lanes running down this road, whichever side you’re on
Accounts for where you want to go, or what you’re running from
Back when darkness overtook me on a blind man’s curve

I relied upon the moon, I relied upon the moon
I relied upon the moon and Saint Christopher
Now I’ve paid my dues cuz I have owed them, but I’ve paid a price sometimes
For being such a stubborn woman in such stubborn times

Now I’ve paid my dues cuz I have owed them, but I’ve paid a price sometimes
For being such a stubborn woman in such stubborn times
Now I have run from the arms of lovers, I’ve run from the eyes of friends
I have run from the hands of kindness, I’ve run just because I can

But now I’m grown and I speak like a woman and I see with a woman’s eyes
And an open door is to me now like the saddest of goodbyes
It’s too late for turning back, I pray for the heart and the nerve

And I rely upon the moon, I rely upon the moon
I rely upon the moon and Saint Christopher

I rely upon the moon, I rely upon the moon
I rely upon the moon and Saint Christopher

MARY CHAPIN CARPENTER – Fading Away

You are fading away in pieces and parts
Like old china and glass, in fragments and shards
Moment by moment, a day at a time
By the side of the road, in the dark of the night

You are leaving me here like the seasons will do
Leaving nothing behind but I know it was you
That walked where I walk now, that stood where I stand
Some phantom performing a strange sleight of hand

And the places I see are returning once more
To the places I knew them to be long before
They merged with your laugh
They locked with your eyes
I have almost regained them,
Along with my stride

You are turning to nothing like ash off a fire
As it rises and floats up higher and higher
As the flame slowly dies and the fire turns cold
Like the color of sky the higher you go

And the world that I see is returning once more
To the world that I knew it be long before
It had merged with your laugh
It had locked with your eyes
I’ve been letting it go, with all my goodbyes

You are blurring like memory and falling like dust
On old wedding bouquets, the roses and rust
On the wheel, on the mantle,
In the quiet of day
You are vanishing slowly
You are fading away