There is a first time for everything There was a first time we went to have Thai food together I didn't know it would also be our last There was a first time we got drunk together I didn't know there would also be a last time There was a first time we had a video call I didn't know we would also have a very last video call There was a first time we jumped off that bridge I didn't know it would be the last There was a first time we sang and played Mr. Tambourine man I didn't know there would also be a last There was a first time we were all gathered in one room I didn't recognize it, when it was also the last time we gathered, before we were all scattered across the country There was the first day I felt it was summer But I never really realized when it was the last We celebrate the firsts And we miss the lasts Grief is love without a place to go to Grief is not the enemy of joy Grief is joy with a touch of realism And then, I didn't know at the time That it ...

Patti stepped out of the tent Into the sunlight The day was dawning The moorcock on the heather was startled It was as if it would cry Go back! Go back! There was mist on the heather The mist was rising Robert walked through the mist towards the tent He walked slowly, gracefully, elegantly Robert was beautiful He was the most beautiful man Patti knew She thought of the first time they kissed They were in her room Patti was sitting with her back against the bed Robert was lying on the bed Patti told him about all the books she had She introduced him to the beautiful books that were in her bookshelf And he wasn't impressed He just looked at her And then he kissed her. They first met at the beach Patti asked Robert if he wants to go on a mushroom trip with her And he said yes. Patti looked at him now, walking towards her in the mist He came from his excavation He will say something to her In just a moment Now she just looks at him Or is it really him? She felt nervous When she feels n...

One day Jimmy Joe decided, he doesn't need their organization. He had shined their shoes He had washed their feet He had moved their mountains What was done was done What was won was won And what was lost was lost and gone forever He walked into the tavern He tipped his hat to the lady A whiskey was brought to him He sat on the stool He asked himself Is there a feeling that has never been felt? Is everything you can experience recorded out there? In novels, songs, poetry? Why do some people die so young? Why do others keep on living even if they wish to go? What is grief?  If I grief one thing, does it make me feel less love for another? How many tears fit into the canal? His son had answered: Two. Is there life on Mars? Is there life after death? Is there life in another solar system? Why is there life on Earth? Is there life on Earth? Am I alive? When do I know that I'm dead? Do we live again? Have I lived before? What is the meaning of life? Will I be happier tomorrow than I...

Life Isn't about finding yourself Or finding anything Life Is about creating yourself And creating things Tim stared into space. He was high as the clouds. All responsibilities didn't matter for a while.  He just wanted to be high. Life had been tough on him. Normal, but tough. So many questions and no answers. So many answers but no questions. So much life and so little love. Love in abundance but no one who listens. Karaoke but nobody really listening to him sing. His friend Tash asked him to join the stage so they could sing a song in Spanish. Tim didn't know the song and didn't know any Spanish. He felt humiliated. Tash said he was fat. That didn't feel nice. They got drunk on Tequilas. "Don't fall asleep in the pub", said Tash. But what did it all really matter. Tim wasted his time on Tash. Tash didn't love him, she only cared about herself. She never remembered anything Tim had said. I was born in Blackwood, I grew up on a farm. We had mustan...

One last look at the adorable scene in the delivery room The Golden Hour Baby snuggled at mothers chest, father kneeling beside them Adoring and in love with the new life created The doula waves her hand Sends her love their way And opens the door Steps out into the hallway The bright light blending her sight She passes the midwives, the doctors and staff Heads down the elevator, passes the cafeteria filled with chattering people Nears the exit of the hospital Passes the children's and youth's emergency department An old grey-haired man standing against a wall Shouting, crying, nothing there to comfort him But his wife An old lady herself, patting his back Nothing there to take a lost life back How fine the line, between life and death Thinks the doula and drowns her thoughts with loud music in her ear. Rock bottom's where we live And still we dig these trenches To bury ourselves in them Backs breaking under tension For far too long these voices Muffled by distances It'...

A group of friends of all trades Rubbing each other's backs Barbecues on chilly spring evenings Talking about life and death Admiring the endless light Listening to Mumford and Sons Dancing naked in the forest Pure serenity Whiskey in a hip flask Someone takes out a guitar Someone falls in love Staying awake until it gets light again Someone needs to stay sober to get us back home All good things come to an end Shattered around the country, the world We collectively separately think of those times We all agree They were good. But it was not your fault but mine And it was your heart on the line I really fucked it up this time Didn't I, my dear?

Eamonn looked down upon his hands He had to admit - he very much disregarded, yes even detested himself After he had spoken, he started to hate every word he said, Nothing of it was pleasant and it was as if he heard himself speak rather than producing speech himself He used to consider himself rather amusing, he could recall people laughing at his humorous jokes These days he tried to be funny But nothing he said was considered hilarious in any way He might have as well remained quiet Sometimes when people started to laugh after he spoke it was rather they were laughing at him than laughing at his jests What a miserable life he lead Once there was Apple Apple loved to get high with Eamonn They'd sit around the campfire with all their friends and pass the pipe around Apple and Eamonn dreamed of poems and prayers and promises They dreamed of having four children Their names be Rosemary, Sage, Parsley and Thyme But it all came different As it is in life Things turn out different than...

Time seems to be linear When I was sixteen, "Seventeen forever" was my number one song These days I can't stand listening to it Nonetheless, they were right We won't be seventeen forever Sometimes we can't return to being seventeen because we're gone And we're not there to wonder whether we could return Friends, partners, offspring, family..  There is nothing and nobody that we really own Everything and everyone is on loan There is nothing we can hold on to Only barely ourselves Life is hard Just for some it is harder than for others Some have to go through a living hell And won't get out of it While others go through smaller living hells And come out of them stronger and healthier There is nothing we can take for granted Still we are full of pretentious confidence Perhaps this being a mode of survival It laces up the throats of others What have we learned? Here and now is what matters It's really all we have Apart from the memory of being seventee...

 The line between life and death is a fine line At it's best, the very start of life is wonderful Leaving everyone involved empowered and strong Paving a fruitful ground to generations to come Connecting and rejoicing Leaving room for growth and progress Changing lives forever At it's best the end of life is peaceful A long, resourceful life lived Memories to look back to with a smile Non, je ne regrette rien No, I don't regret a thing At it's worst, the very start of life is painful Suffering lasting all the way through No way out of a living hell, no way through No happily ever after But darkness that seems to never end At it's worst the end of life is agitated Broken dreams, a broken future A life taken away too early In the middle of it all All hopes vanished, a blurred vision A long and painful road to eternity Eyes remain shut The line between life and death is a very fine line And I believe in love And I know that you do too And I believe in some kind of path...

Once upon a time Liesl stumbled on the side of twelve misty mountains She was wonderful. Life was phenomenal and impeccable. Until it wasn't anymore. Jarl knocked on Liesl's oak-wooden door at her home in a valley one fine sunny, Sunday afternoon. He introduced himself as an interventionist god. He apologized for having to intervene in her perfect life. There was too much perfection and too much happiness. He cut her wheat before it was ripe. He trampled on her tomatoes and tore her potatoes out of the ground. Jarl cursed Liesl's land. For no reason whatsoever. Jarl peed into her well so that all her drinking-water was contaminated. It was his duty to intervene. He fried Liesl's chicken and smashed all their eggs to the ground. Once I had mountains in the palm of my hand And rivers that ran through every day I must have been mad I never knew what I had Until I threw it all away

You live like you're afraid to die You'll die like you're afraid to go --- We build our house of cards  and then we wait for it to fall Always forget how strange it is just to be alive at all

"Avant Garde? French for Bullshit" Said John. A few years passed and John and his better half were promenating in pretty deep bullshit "Why she had to go, I don't know? She wouldn't say" Said Paul. John heard "Coming Up" and quit baking bread in order to return to the recording studios. Then just a breath later, moonlight shadow and he was shot. Paul wrote several silly love songs, and Yes, "Silly Love songs". "The only thing you done was Yesterday" Said John. They did their best work in their 20's Now it's the 20's once more, is this our best work?

These are the words of another Dick Gaughan Now westlin winds and slaughtering guns Bring autumn's pleasant weather The moorcock springs on whirring wings Among the blooming heather Now waving grain, wild o'er the plain Delights the weary farmer And the moon shines bright as I rove at night To muse upon my charmer The partridge loves the fruitful fells The plover loves the mountain The woodcock haunts the lonely dells The soaring hern the fountain Through lofty groves the cushat roves The path of man to shun it The hazel bush o'erhangs the thrush The spreading thorn the linnet Thus every kind their pleasure find The savage and the tender Some social join and leagues combine Some solitary wander Avaunt! Away! the cruel sway, Tyrannic man's dominion The sportsman's joy, the murdering cry The fluttering, gory pinion But Peggy dear the evening's clear Thick flies the skimming swallow The sky is blue, the fields in view  All fading green and yellow Come let us stray ...

  Now you're telling me,  you're not nostalgic Then give me another word for it Once upon a time there was a lot of gaiety in William's life Most his days were frolic and bright But those days were gone Now he was a man of old age with a heart filled with cynicism He used to be optimistic But the rough paths life had taken him on had made him cynical He used to love and be loved Laugh and be laughed at Drink and be drunk with Teach and be taught He used to do everything that a human soul needed to be spirited and nourished However these days he'd scorn and be scorned at His soul he had sold Though it was not too late for change He wanted to be frolic again So his medicine was to dwell on nostalgic feelings and tunes of the good old times And that he did until the day he died

 Once upon a time there was Melanie  Her gait was secure  Her poems were true  Her grandeur was bright  Her skill was shocking  She flooded every room she entered with sunlight  She was nordic noble  She turned every annoyance into joy  She bent the rainbow  She wanted to turn around on the shot run  She pushed throught all tides  She passed away  Life is not fair.

We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl, year after year... Running over the same old ground, what have we found? The same old fears. As it is, each good piece of music out there has it's best part. And as it was, Ahab found this part with the fish bowl to be the best part of a particular chanson. It made him think of his mate Moby, who happened to be a big fish. Or well, a big fish was a rather vague description of something as mysterious as Moby. Cetacea in the suborder of Whippomorpha in the order Artidactyla in the class of Mammalia in the phylum of Chordata and lastly in the kingdom of Animalia . That he was, Moby. But you see, Moby was not just a big fish. Not just a giant mammal. He also possessed the soul of his long-passed friend, a human friend that had left the Earth way too young, Nohel. To Ahab, Nohel had not just been a friend. Nohel had been the only friend Ahab ever had. Nohel was Ahabs better half. Nohel's death was tragic. Dea...

Once upon a time there was a young woman named Sophie. She didn't consider her exterior as very pretty for she had crooked teeth, thin and oily hair, chubby cheeks, scars on her face, a flat chest, muscular arms, thick-skinned fingers, giant feet and short, hairy legs. In addition to those aesthetic features she couldn't help farting all the while which kept both friends and enemies at a distance. It just so happened that she realized there was nothing she could do to change her appearance thus did she decide to become sophisticated. At first, she had to teach herself to read. And once she had acquired the skill of reading she read some Tolstoy who taught her the skill of patience, after all was he a man of many words. Through the works of Austen Sophie learned what it meant to be an accomplished woman. Not only reading books seemed to be of importance but also being able to read music. So she learned to read sheet music and to play the piano. She also learned to play se...

Once upon a time there was a sailor named Flynn who said this much: When I was a young boy I wanted to sail around the world That's the life for me, living on the sea Spirit of a sailor, circumnavigates the globe The lust of a pioneer, will acknowledge no frontier I remember you by, thunderclap in the sky Lightning flash, tempers flare, 'round the horn if you dare I just spent six months in a leaky boat Lucky just to keep afloat Aotearoa, rugged individual Glisten like a pearl, at the bottom of the world The tyranny of distance, didn't stop the cavalier So why should it stop me, I'll conquer and stay free Ah c'mon all you lads, let's forget and forgive There's a world to explore, tales to tell back on shore I just spent six months in a leaky boat Six months in a leaky boat Ship-wrecked love can be cruel Don't be fooled by her kind There's a wind in my sails Will protect and prevail I just spen...

Someone once told Ayako that music can influence ones mood and create internal experiences such as sadness or joy without any preceding events or reasons for those emotions but the music itself. She listened to a Tracy Chapaman CD while outside the rain was pouring and heavyhearted is how she felt. " If he wants the chances that you took from him and nothing that you own Then there be no place to run to There'll be no place to run And if he finds himself to be A reflection of us all Bang bang bang He'll shoot us down " Was it solely the sad song that made her heart weigh a thousand pounds? Or was it because of an unconscious sphere in her brain that became conscious that very moment when she got a vivid piece of memory of the very first time she heard that Tracy Chapman song several decades ago? Silly sadness overcame her when she thought of that one car ride half a century ago when Radio Nostalgia was playing on the old poor quality car...

Once upon a time there was Mr. Knowles. He was a deeply warm-hearted person who had acquired a vast amount of knowledge during the course of his life. Mr. Knowles was a man of age and wisdom but he had a hard time making new friends. Once he was queuing to a ticket booth. He wanted to get a ticket for a ballet he'd always wanted to see. There in front of him stood a tall man with broad shoulders and an angular face. The man started to speak to Mr. Knowles, telling him about his daughter that was going to be performing at that ballet and how proud he was of her. The angular faced man had a strong accent that Mr. Knowles recognized to be a Russian accent. Mr. Knowles had learned to hate the Russians all through his whole life. He thought of the words his father had told him:  If another war comes, it's them we must fight to hate them and fear them, to run and to hide. And accept it all bravely with god on our side. Mr. Knowles nodded silently to the words the Russian man sai...