It was early nineteen thirty four
The world was set to change
Europe was on fire
It was time to rearrange

Poland was the first stop
The German Army on the move
So we left for America
I hope you did approve

You came with me to Jersey
On a trip across the sea
You've guarded all my secrets
Known by only you and me

You used to spin quite gaily
Now you just stand there en pointe
You're my clipped wing little angel
That's the name I shall anoint

Thumbelina, Ballerina
Dance your dance for me
We've been together eighty years
You are who I want to be
Thumbelina, Ballerina
Just one more pirouette
We've been together all this time
Our dancing's not done yet

I sit here and remember
All the treasures you once hid
You've still some trinkets in there
Some from when I was a kid

Your tu tu is all tattered
The silk lining frayed and torn
But, you've held together nicely
But, I guess we're both quite worn

Your lipstick isn't red now
I hear your music in my head
It hasn't played for 50 years
I just remember it instead

The music gave up playing
You were slightly over wound
But, you still twirled and kept dancing
Even though there was no sound

Thumbelina, Ballerina
Dance your dance for me
We've been together eighty years
You are who I want to be
Thumbelina, Ballerina
Just one more pirouette
We've been together all this time
Our dancing's not done yet

I've told you more than anyone
Than I have ever known
We've been together now forever
You're the most precious thing I own

You've been with me for two husbands
And you've seen my kids pass on
There's just me and you,  my dancing girl
All the rest of them are gone

Your paint is chipped and cracked
Your pony tail is broken too
If I still can recollect now
In the fall of fifty two

Your spring is rusted tightly
You need a hand to stand up right
But, then again, I do as well
And most days it's quite the fight

Thumbelina, Ballerina
Dance your dance for me
We've been together eighty years
You are who I want to be
Thumbelina, Ballerina
Just one more pirouette
We've been together all this time
Our dancing's not done yet


Charms and little trinkets
Plastic jewellery, real as well
Secrets of a child
Secrets you would never tell

I am now moving to December
Of my calendar of years
Soon my life will end and
There's no one left to shed  me tears

I sit here and I wonder
What shall become of you
My Thumbelina Ballerina
In your dancing dress of blue

You started as a music box
You are not used as that no more
But, Thumbelina Ballerina
Will you dance for me once more?

Thumbelina, Ballerina
Dance your dance for me
We've been together eighty years
You are who I want to be
Thumbelina, Ballerina
Just one more pirouette
We've been together all this time
Our dancing's not done yet

There used to be a time when you were paddling down the river
You'd hear that banjo song and you'd go all a quiver
You know the song I mean it always made me shiver
Now, there's something scarier when you're out there on that river

(banjo music...deliverance theme)

No matter how far south you go there's tv shows galore
Cajun this and Cajun that and Cajun even more
Louisiana sold out it's a reality tv *****
If you find name one show that's filming you know there's 15 more

(banjo music...deliverance theme)

Of all the shows out there I don't get Honey Boo Boo
I mean, look at how that child looks we're talking nasty ju ju
There's a high priestess out there who did some Boo Boo Voo Doo
I've never seen another kid who looks like Honey Boo Boo

(banjo music....deliverance theme)

There's not a place down south not owned by Duck Commander
They own the rights on everything, on every salamander
If there's a deal on anything, these good old boys will land 'er
The Robertson's own everything, those Buck 'n Duck Commanders

(banjo music...deliverance theme)

Now, as I said that banjo song was scary and it was a real big hit
But, now it takes up second place, something else will make you '***
No need to fear the banjo being played by a hermit
It's when the State Trooper asks..."Boy, where's your paid up film permit?"

( banjo music...deliverance playout)

Sometimes
it all seems so real
     Like this reality weighs heavily on my chest and I can’t breathe.
my stomach jumps and sends this cold fire throughout my body and I feel it.

I feel the world boiling in my consciousness and there’s no release that could possibly be worthy of this feeling.
Then I tell myself I'm just being dramatic and I tamp that feeling down with my fear and sadness and a yearning for eventualities.
Sometimes I’m not sure what I mean.
Sometimes I make stuff up.
But really I’m just an awkward almost-twenty year old who wants her life to be something.
Extraordinary
But.so.is.everyone.else.
And isn’t that right?
Isn’t that rich?
That we are all one.
A vast ocean of “ones”.
I’m really just a wave.
And it is alright to be a wave.
Because waves, they move.
It’s alright to be dramatic though. Why not?
I have this mind that wants out and I keep suppressing it. At least I’m pretty sure I do. Maybe I don’t. Maybe it is only on occasion that I tell it to shut up because it all is just too much.
That’s probably it.
Who am I really?
I guess I could list all of my traits and that could be who I am. Or what I have accomplished in life, and presto, you have…me.
Then there’s this consciousness that sits inside this flesh and controls it. That could be who I am. But that consciousness is just the acts it has achieved and the traits it has portrayed, is it not?
So I guess what I’m saying is.
The I that is me has not achieved satisfactory on my scale of living by which I measure my worth.

Not yet anyway

Broken vows,
Sounds of bellowing cows,
No wedding bells
A broken heart tells no tales

Nonsense in my sense
Calculating emotional expenses
Excuses for a lost moment
Fragrance without a scent

A heart grieving in silence
With walls shedding tears of innocence
Rage of innocence I guess
The fight of a bleeding heart- one in rags

Naked and vulnerable like a mother less toddler
Speech turned sour- now a babbler
Blah-blah, tongue twisting tale
Hailing hot from hell

Promises fallen on thorns
Pierced to the bones
Wilted words on dry ground
Salted seeds don’t count

No harvest this summer
Extract the pain in my grammar
And it will narrate my mistakes
Mistaken for forgiveness, commitment crucified on the stakes

This is the thesis
Thesis of a broken heart
Broken into many pieces
Smudged art…

Broken vows
Sounds of bellowing cows,
No wedding bells
A broken heart tells no tales

He would declare and could himself believe
That the birds there in all the garden round
From having heard the daylong voice of Eve
Had added to their own an oversound,
Her tone of meaning but without the words.
Admittedly an eloquence so soft
Could only have had an influence on birds
When call or laughter carried it aloft.
Be that as may be, she was in their song.
Moreover her voice upon their voices crossed
Had now persisted in the woods so long
That probably it never would be lost.
Never again would birds’ song be the same.
And to do that to birds was why she came.