Tonight, my friend, you enkindled me.
Because its so much better on paper, you said to me.
Because you proved to me that fidelity and love are not a myth.
Because you remembered something I said to you weeks ago.
Because you stayed around when it all fell apart, when I fell apart.
Because you heard me when all the world was deaf.

Tonight, my friend, you changed my mind.
I decided not to settle for solitude.
I decided that there are things I'll miss about this little town.
I decided to make myself a better person.
I decided to be the kind of friend a friend would like to have.
I decided not to give in to the often-prevailing darkness.

Tonight, my friend, you brought me joy.
Always you were my strength when I was weak.
Always will I be here for you to do the same.
Always you can count on me, rain or shine.
Always will you be a brother to me.
Always will I read Dickinson and think of you.

I remember falling in love
It was magical,
It was quick,
I was helpless.
You blew me away
Like a storm on a dark cloud
I was lost from the start.
Like a little wandering child.
I don't remember falling out
It was slow and gradual,
Maybe the jealousy
Or the way you didn't care
But either way I lost it.
The desire to be with you
It's truely gone
You weren't who I wanted
You changed too much.

Teaching high school kids the craft
Directing them in their school show
Teenagers singing just off key
With a band that's one beat slow
Holding rehearsals when the gym is free
Have you really sunk this low
Are you truly at your bottom
Or are you "Waiting for Godot"?

"YOU'RE ON IN FIFTEEN MINUTES...MR. WILSON"

Doing plays in local theater groups
With untrained  amateurs on stage
You tell them all your stories
And you keep them on their page
It's not exactly where you started
Talent that you just can't gauge
Selling programs in the lobby
It's time you act your age

"TEN MINUTES TILL SHOWTIME MR. WILSON"

Touring shows around the country now
Second touring group, smaller towns
Doing revival shows of Sondheim
"Sweeney Todd " and "Send in the clowns"
Living out of an old suitcase
The countryside a sea of browns
Where you are at the local's mercy
And there's less ups than there are downs

"FIVE MINUTES TO SHOW TIME MR. WILSON"

You've made it, you're on Broadway
Starring roles are yours to choose
Where the highlights of last nights show
Are in today's reviews
Where a sold out run continues
And your name is in the news
You're an actor, and you're famous
The world is yours to lose

"SHOW TIME MR.. WILSON...ON STAGE PLEASE"

The kids are out there schlepping
working their way through the *****
singing songs sung by the Beatles
"All This and World War II"
You're just a pillar standing, sweating
As you see what you can do
You're still an actor, and you know it
You'll need a drink when this is through.

A shell
is a wonderful thing to have,
if you can carry it.

This is not the world
where I had wanted to live,
I had not hoped
for deserts and desertions
and gilded cages,

a world where the tortured tortoise
can no longer be sure
if armor imprisons
or protects.

There is a version of this story,
where slow and steady wins the race--
that was another age, a different world,
and in our story they run for their lives
and no one wins.

Bullets and arrows are streaming through the air
and the world tastes like mud,
and this is not about virtue anymore.

The hare is fast
but his skin is thin,
he is too soft for our story.
There is no room for knowing smirks
and this is not about speed.

You want winners and losers,
you want a moral,
you want something like salvation
or a punchline.
You say it's the least I could do for you,
after all this trouble.

And I say I'm sorry, I'm sorry,
but the tortoise survives,

and isn't that a consolation,
isn't that something?

She can be my Juliet, her heart is my prize.
Save me from myself but lead to my demise.
Ill be her Romeo, more or less I suppose.
Ill die for her, if that's the way that it goes.
Our love is forbidden, shunned by our surrounding persons.
But without my girl, the pain only worsens.
So ill take a stab, straight into my beating heart
If it means, in the end, we never see need to part.