JOANNA NEWSOM

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Newsom grew up in the small town of Nevada City, California. As a child, Newsom was not allowed to watch television or listen to the radio because she was raised by doctors who were “kind of idealists when it came to hoping they could protectus from bad in-fluences, like violent movies, or stupid stuff”. She was exposed to music from a young age.

Her father played the guitar and her mother was a classically trained pianist who played the hammered dulcimer, the autoharp and conga drums. She attended a Waldorf school where she stud-ied theater and learned to memorize and recite long poems. This skill helps her to remember lyrics while on tour. At the age of 5, Newsom asked her parents if she could play the harp. Her parents eventually agreed to sign her up for harp lessons, but the local harp teacher did not want to take on such a young student and suggested she learn to play the piano first. Starting at the age of four, she be-gan playing the piano and later the harp which she “loved from the first lesson onward.” From her instructor, Joanna learned composi-tion and improvisation.

She learned to play on smaller Celtic harps until her parents bought her a full-size pedal harp in the seventh grade. During her teens, she and the instrument became inseparable, and she describes her relationship with the harp as similar to “an artifi-cial limb or a wheelchair. It’s almost part of me, but more to the point, it serves a purpose, and if it wasn’t there I would wonder what was supposed to fit in its place.” She studied composition and creative writing at Mills College in Oakland, California. While at Mills, she played keyboards in The Pleased. She dropped out of the school in order to focus on her music.

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The Milk-Eyed Mender is the de-but album by American singer-song-writer Joanna Newsom, released on March 23, 2004 on the Drag City label (see 2004 in music). Joanna Newsom wrote all the songs on the album except for Three Little Babes, a traditional Appalachian song by Texas Gladden. According to the liner notes,

Joanna plays “a Lyon & Healy style 15 harp, a wurlitzer electric piano, a harpsichord, and piano.”

A bandmate in San Francisco band The Pleased, Noah Georgeson, produced and recorded the album, as well as contributing gui- tar to two tracks and backing vocals to one. Cover art embroidery is by Emily Prince and photographs are by Alissa Anderson. Newsom thanks former touring partners Will Oldham, Dev-endra Banhart, and Vetiver, along with many others. The album received largely positive reviews upon its release, earning Newsom several accolades that same year and by the end of the decade. In 2009, Pitchfork Media named The Milk-Eyed Mender the 47th greatest album of the 00’s.

THE MILK-EYED MENDER(Drag City, 2004)

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The website also named Peach, Plum, Pear the 197th Greatest Song of the 2000s and Sprout & The Bean the 229th. Slant Magazine named the album the 83rd best album of its decade. The Milk-Eyed Mender was also ranked number 76 inside Tiny Mix Tapes’s great-est records of the 2000s list.

According to The New York Times The Milk-Eyed Mender has sold more than 200,000 copies in the U.S., despite not charting.

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Bridges and Balloons(3:42)

We sailed away on a winter’s dayWith fate as malleable as clay

But ships are fallible, I sayAnd the nautical, like all things, fades

And I can recall our caravelA little wicker beetle-shell

With four fine masts and lateen sailsIts bearings on cair paravel

Oh my loveOh it was a funny little thing

To be the ones to’ve seen

The sight of bridges and balloonsMakes calm canaries irritable

And they caw and claw all afternoonCatenaries and dirigibles

Brace and buoy the livingroomA loom of metal, warp - woof - wimbleAnd a thimble’s worth of milky moon

Can touch hearts larger than a thimble

Oh my loveOh it was a fun ny little thing

To be the ones to’ve seen

Oh my loveOh it was a funny little thing

It was a funny, funny little thing To be the ones to’ve seen

Sprout and the Bean(4:32)

I slept all dayI woke with distaste

And I railedAnd I raved

That the difference betweenThe sprout and the bean

It is a golden ringIt is a twisted string

And you can ask the counsellorYou can ask the king

And they’ll say the same thingAnd it’s a funny thingShould we go outsideShould we go outside

Should we break some breadAre y’interested

And as I saidI slept as though dead

Dreaming seamless dreamsOf lead

When you go awayI am big-boned and feyIn the dust of the day

And in the dirt of the day

And the danger, danger drawing near them was a white coat

And the danger, danger drawing near them was a broad boat

And the water, water running clear beneath a white throat

And the hollow chatter of the talking of the tadpoles

Who know th’outsideShould we go outside

Should we break some breadAre y’interested

The book of Right-on(4:29)

We should shine a light on, a light on

And the book of right-on’s right-on, it was right-on

We should shine a light on, a light-on

And the book of right-on’s right-on, it was right-on

I killed my dinner with karateKick ‘em in the face, taste the bodyShallow work is the work that I do

Do you want to sit at my tableMy fighting fame is fabled

And fortune finds me fit and able

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And you do say - oh oh That you do pray - oh oh

And you say that you’re okayAnd do you want to run with my pack?

Do you want to ride on my back?Pray that what you lack

does not distract

And even when you run through my mind

Something else is in front, oh, you’re behind

And I don’t have to remind you to stick with your kind

And you do say - oh oh That you do pray - oh oh

And you say that you’re okay

And even when you touch my face

You know your placeAnd even when

you touch my faceYou know your place

And we should shine a light on a light on

And the book of right-on’s right-onIt was right-on

And we should shine a light on, a light on

And the book of right-on’s right-on, it was right-on

Sadie(6:02)

Sadie, white coatYou carry me homeAnd bury this bone

And take this pine cone

Bury this boneTo gnaw on it later, gnawing

on the telephoneAnd ‘til then we pray and suspend

The notion that these lives do never end

And all day long we talk about mercy

Lead me to water, lord, I sure am thirsty

Down in the ditch where I nearly served you

Up in the clouds where he almost heard youAnd all that we built

And all that we breathedAnd all that we spilt

Or pulled up like weedsIs piled up in back

And it burns irrevocablyAnd we spoke up in turns

‘Til the silence crept over me

And bless youAnd I deeply do

No longer resoluteOh when I call to you

But the water Got so cold

And you do lose What you don’t hold

This is an old songThese are old blues

And this is not my tuneBut it’s mine to use

And the seabirdsWhere the fear once grew

Will flock with a furyAnd they will bury

What’d come for you

And down where I darn with the milk-eyed mender

You and I and a love so tenderStretched on a hoop where

I stitch this adageBless our house and its heart so savage

And all that I wantAnd all that I needAnd all that I’ve gotIs scattered like seed

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And all that I knewIs moving away from me

And all that I knowIs blowing like tumbleweed

And the mealy wormsIn the brine will burn In a salty pyre

Among the fauns and ferns

And the love we holdAnd the love we spurnWill never grow cold

Only taciturn

And i’ll tell you tomorrowOh sadie, go on home, now

And bless those who’ve sickened belowAnd bless us who have chosen so

And all that I’ve gotAnd all that I need I tie in a knot

And I lay at your feetAnd I have not forgot

But a silence crept over me

So dig up your boneExhume your pinecone, sadie

Inflammatory Writ(2:50)

Oh, where is your inflammatory writ?Your text that

would incite a light; ‘be lit’

Our music deservingDevotion unswerving

Cried; ‘do I deserve her?’With unflagging fervor

Well, no we do not, if we cannot get over it

But what’s it mean when suddenly we’re spent? - tell me true

Ambition came and reared its head and went - far from you

Even mollusks have weddingsThough solemn and leadenBut you dirge for the dead

And take no jam on your breadJust a supper of salt and a waltz

through your empty bed

And all at once It came to meAnd I wrote in hunch ‘til four-thirty

But that vestal lightIt burns out with the night

In spite of all the time that we spend on it

Om one bedraggled ghost of a sonnetWhile outside the wild boars root

Without bending a bough underfootOh, it breaks my heart - I don’t know

how they do it

So don’t ask me!

And as for my inflammatory writ?Well I wrote it and

I was not inflamed one bit

Advice from the masterDerailed that disasterSaid; ‘hand that pen

over to me, poetaster!’While across the great plains

Keening lovely & awfulUlulate the last great

american novelsAn unlawful lot left, to stutter

and freeze floodlitBut at least they didn’t run,

to their undying credit

This Side of the Blue(5:21)

Svetlana sucks lemons across from meAnd I am progressing abominably

And I do not know my own way to the sea

But the saltiest sea knows its own way to me

And the city that turns, turns protracted and slow

And I find myself toeing

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the embarcaderoAnd I find myself knowing

the things that I knewWhich is all that you can know

on this side of the blue

And jaime has eyes black and shiny as boots

And they march at you two-by-two(-re-loo-re-loo)

When she looks at you, you know that

she’s nowhere near throughIt’s the kindest heart beating

this side of the blue

And the signifieds butt heads with the signifiers

And we all fall down slack-jawed to marvel at words

When across the sky sheet the impossible birdsIn a steady illiterate

movement homewards

And gabriel stands beneath forest and moon

See them rattle and boo, and see them shake, and see them loom

See him fashion a cap from a page of camus

And see him navigate deftly this side of the blue

And the rest of our lives will the moments accrue

When the shape of their goneness will flare up anew

Then we do what we have to do(-re-loo-re-loo)

Which is all that you can do on this side of the blue

Ot it’s all that you can do on this side of the blue

Oh it’s all that you can do on this side of the blue

En Gallop(5:07)

This place is damp and ghostly, I am already gone

And the halls were lined with the disembodied

And dustly wings which fell from flesh, Gasplessly

And I go where the trees goAnd I walk from a higher education

For now, and for hireIt beats me but I do not know

And it beats me but I do not knowIt beats me but I do not know

I do not know

Palaces and stormcloudsThe rought straggly sage and the smoke

And the way it will all come togetherIn quietness, and in time

And you laws of propertyOh, you free economy

And you unending afterthoughts;You could’ve told me before

Never get so attached to a poem, youForget truth that lacks lyricism, and

Never draw so close to the heat, thatYou will forget that you must eat, oh

Cassiopeia(3:20)

Feel the mattress tense beneath meLike the muscle of non-sleepy

Feathers flexing will defeat meAnd it vexes me complet-e-ly

And the hexes heat covertlyLike a slow low-flying turkey

Like a texan drying jerkyBut his meaty mitts can’t hurt me

With my steely will compoundedIn a mighty mound that’s hounded

By the snap your steel string soundedJust before your snores unwound it

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And in store are dreams so daringThat the night can’t stop from staring

And i’ll swim sweetly as a herringThrough the ether not despairing

Go to sleep You stunning sky

Gently creepCunning by

Quiet humIs amplified

By your thumbThat you suck dry

Hundred raging waters snare the lonely sigh

Oh, you hold your breath and clasp at cassiopeia

Hundred raging waters snare the lonely sigh

Oh, and you hold your breath and clasp at cassiopeia

Cassiopeia Cassiopeia Cassiopeia

Peach, Plum, Pear(3:34)

We speak in the storeI’m a sensitive bore

And you’re markedly moreAnd I’m oozing suprise

But it’s late in the dayAnd you’re well on your wayWhat was golden went gray

And I’m suddenly shy

And the gathering flooziesAfford to be choosy

And all sneezing darklyIn the dimming divide

And I have read the right booksTo interpret your looks

You were knocking me downWith the palm of your eye

Go; na na na na na na na na na naNa na na na na na na na na na

Na na na na na na na na

This was unlike the storyIt was written to beI was riding its back

When it used to ride me

And we were galloping manicTo the mouth of the sourceWe were swallowing panic

In the face of its force

And I was blueI am blue and unwell

Made me bolt like a horse[made me bold like a whore]

And; na na na na na na na na na naNa na na na na na na na na na

Na na na na na na na na

Now it’s doneWatch it go

And you’ve changed so

Water run from the snow

Am I so dear?Do I run rare?

And you’ve changedSo

Peach, plum, pearPeach, plum

Swamsea(5:05)

If you wanna come on downDown with your bones so white

And watch the freight trains poundInto the wild wild night

How I would love to gnawGnaw on your bones so white

And watch as the freight trains pawPaw at the wild wild night

All these ghost towns

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Wreathed in old loamAssateague knee Deep in seafoam

Ho, swansea! Buttonwillow!Lagunitas! Ho, calico!

And all these beastly bungalowsStare distend like endless toads

Endlessly hop down the roadBorne by wind we southward blow

And yonder, wild and blueThe wild blue yonder looms

‘Til we are wracked with rheumBy roads, by songs entombed

And all we wanna doIs chew and chew and chew

Dear one! Drive on

When all we wanna doIs chew and chew and chew

And if you wanna come on downDown with your bones so white

And watch the freight trains poundInto the wild wild night

How I would love to gnawTo gnaw on your bones so-o white

And watch while the freight trains pawPaw at the wild wild night

Paw at the wild wild night Paw at the wild wild night

Three Little Babies(3:42)

There was a knight and a lady brightAnd three little babes had she

She sent them away to a far countryTo learn their grammary

They hadn’t been gone but a very short time

About three months and a dayWhen the lark spread

over this whole wide worldAnd taken those babes away

it was on a cold cold christmas nightWhen everything was still

And she saw her three little babes come running

Come running down the hill

She set them a table of bread and wineThat they might drink and eat

She spread them a bed of a winding sheet

That they might sleep so sweet

‘Take it off, take it off!’, cried the eldest one

‘Take it off, take it off!’, cried she‘For I shan’t stay here in this wicked world

When there’s a better one for me’

‘Cold clods, cold clods inside my bedCold clods, down at my feet

The tears my dear mother shed for meWould wet my winding sheet’

‘The tears my dear mother shed for meWould wet my winding sheetWould wet my winding sheet’

Clam, Crab, cockle, Cowrie(4:21)

That means noWhere I come from

I am cold, out waiting for the day to come

I chew my lipsAnd I scratch my nose

Feels so good to be a rose

Oh don’t Don’t you lift me upLike I’m that shy no-no-no-no-no, just give it up

See, there are bats all dissolving in a row

Into the wishy-washy dark that can’t let go

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I cannot let goSo I thank the lord

And I thank his swordThough it be mincing up the morning,

slightly bored

Oh oh oh, morningWithout warning

Like a holeOh, and I watch you go

There are some mornings when the sky looks like a road

There are some dragons who were built to have and hold

And some machines are dropped from great heights lovingly

And some great bellies ache with many bumblebees

And they sting so terriblyI do as I please

Now I’m on my kneesYour skin is something that

I stir into my teaAnd I am watching you

And you are starry, starry, starry

(and you will neverEver know how

Very sorry you will be I am)

And I’m tumbling downAnd I check a frown

Well just look aroundThat’s why I love this town

To see me;Serenaded hourlyCelebrated sourlyDedicated dourly

Waltzing with the open seaClam, crab, cockle, cowrieWill you just look at me!

Oh, oh, oh, oh Oh, oh, oh, oh

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Ys (pronounced / i s/, EESS) is the second album by Joanna Newsom. It was released by Drag City on Novem-ber 14, 2006 to widespread critical ac-claim. The album was named after the city of Ys, which according to myth was built on the coast of Brittany and later swallowed by the ocean. In re-cent years, the album has been fea-

tured on several music publications’ lists of the greatest albums of the 2000s as well as all-time.

PRODUCTION

The album features full orchestra arrangements by Van Dyke Parks on four of the five tracks. Parks also con-tributes accordion. Newsom’s harp and vocals were recorded by Steve Albini and the orchestra was record-ed by Tim Boyle. Newsom and Parks pro- duced the album and it was mixed by Jim O’Rourke. The recording process was completely analog, on two 24-track tape record- ers. The music was mixed to tape and mastered at Abbey Road Studios.

YS(Drag City, 2006)

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Bass guitar is contributed by Lee Sklar, and electric guitar by jazz guitarist Grant Geissman. Don Heffington played percussion and Matt Cartsonis played mandolin and banjo. Bill Callahan pro-vides backing vocals on the song Only Skin, while on Emily these are sung by Joanna’s sister Emily Newsom, after whom the song is named. The album, particularly the length of the songs and or-chestral arrangements, was inspired by the 1971 Roy Harper album Stormcock. In September 2007, Harper supported Joanna News-om at her Royal Albert Hall performance, playing Stormcock in its entirety. Newsom was also impressed by Van Dyke Parks’ 1968 al-bum Song Cycle, and asked him to collaborate on Ys after listening to that record. On her fall 2007 tour, Newsom performed the album in its entirety, backed by a 29-piece orchestra.

RECEPTION

The album leaked onto the Internet over two months in advance of its release when it was left unprotected on servers belonging to music criticism website Pitchfork Media. Ys is Newsom’s first al-bum to chart on the U.S. music charts and it has sold more than 250,000 copies. The album entered the Irish Album Chart at #50, and was also nominated for a 2007 Shortlist Music Prize. The track Emily was ranked #9 in Pitchfork Media’s Top 100 Tracks 2006.

Since its release on November 14, 2006, Ys has received wide-spread critical acclaim, including a #1 ranking in Tiny Mix Tapes’ Top 25 Albums of 2006, and CHARTbeat’s Top 100 Albums of 2006 a #3 ranking on Pitchfork Media’s Top 50 Albums of 2006, and a #7 ranking Time magazine’s 10 Best Albums of 2006. It cur-rently has a score of 85 out of 100, the 15th highest scoring al- bum of 2006 on Metacritic.

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By the end of 2006 Ys appeared in more than 50 year-end lists, placing inside the top 10 in 35 of them. Despite a negative review by the US Rolling Stone, the German version of the magazine named the album the second greatest of the year. According to Ac-claimedmusic.net Ys is the third best album of 2006, and so far is the 27th greatest record released this decade and the 271st greatest of all-time. The album was also included in the book 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. In 2009, the album started to ap-pear in many “best of the decade” lists. Pitchfork Media named Ys the 83rd greatest album of the 2000s.

Calling Newsom “unlike anyone else” aside calling the album “the most artistically ambitious indie rock enterprise of the decade” Ys is one of two Joanna Newsom albums placed inside the top 100, the other being The Milk-Eyed Mender . UK magazine Uncut placed the album inside their “150 greatest album of the decade” list, at number 21. Gigwise named Ys the 32nd greatest album of the 2000s commenting that “the record rightly received blanket acclaim upon its initial release and is already sounding better with age. Whether she’ll ever top this new-folk masterpiece remains to be seen.”

The Times placed the album at number 26 in their top 100 al-bums of the decade list, while The Guardian named it one of the ‘1000 Albums To Hear Before You Die’. British magazine Clash placed Ys at number 13 in their ‘50 Greatest Albums Of Our Life-time’ list. German magazine Musikexpress named Ys the 92nd greatest album of the last four decades (1969–2009). Two Spanish magazines, Playground and Rock de Lux, have respectively named Ys their 83rd and 15th greatest album of the 2000s.

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About placed Ys at number one inside their greatest album of the decade list. In 2010, Tiny Mix Tapes named the album the 18th greatest of the 2000s and Cokema- chineglow.com the 81st. Rhap-

sody named it the 46th best album of the 00s.

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Emily(12:05)

The meadowlark and the chim-choo-ree and the sparrowSet to the sky in a flying spree, for the sport of the pharaoh.

A little while later, the Pharisees dragged a comb through the meadow.

Do you remember what they called up to you

and me, in our window?

There is a rusty light on the pines tonight;

Sun pouring wine, lord, or marrow, down into the

Bones of the birches, and the spires of ithe churches, jutting out

from the shadows;The yoke, and the axe, and the old

smokestacks, and the bale, and the barrow

And everything sloped, like it was dragged from a rope, in the mouth

of the south below.

We’ve seen those mountains kneeling, felten and grey.

We thought our very hearts would up and melt away,

From that snow in the nighttime,Just going and going

And the stirring of wind chimesIn the morning In the morning

Helps me find my way back inFrom the place where I have been

And, Emily, I saw you last night by the river.

I dreamed you were skipping little stones across the surface of the water

Frowning at the angle where they were lost, and slipped under forever,

In a mud-cloud, mica-spangled, like the sky’d been breathing on a mirror.

Anyhow, I sat by your side, by the water.

You taught me the names of the stars overhead, that I wrote

down in my ledgerThough all I knew of the rote universe were those Pleiades,

loosed in December,I promised you I’d set them to verse,

so I’d always remember

That the meteorite is the source of the light,

And the meteor’s just what we see;And the meteoroid is a stone that’s de-void of the fire that propelled it to thee.

And the meteorite’s just what causes the light,

And the meteor’s how it’s perceived;And the meteoroid’s a bone thrown

from the void, that lies quiet in offering to thee.

*

You came and lay a cold compress upon the mess I’m in;

Threw the window wide, and cried amen amen amen.

The whole world stopped to hear you hollering.

And you looked down, and saw, now, what was happening:

The lines are fading in my kingdom(though I have never known the way to border them in);

So the muddy mouths of baboons and sows, and the grouse,

and the horse, and the henGrope at the gate

of the looming lake that was once a tiny pen.And the mail is late, and the great estates

are not lit from within.The talk in town’s becoming

downright sickening.

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In due time we will see the far butte lit by a flare.

I’ve seen your bravery, and I will follow you there

And row through the nighttime,Gone healthy,

Gone healthy all of a sudden,

In search of the midwifeWho could help me Who could help me,

Help me find my way back in.There are worries where i’ve been.

Say, say, say, in the lee of the bayDon’t be bothered.

Leave your troubles here,Where the tugboats shear the water from the water

(flanked by furrows, curling back, like a match held up to a newspaper).

Emily, they’ll follow your lead by the letter.

And I make this claim, and I’m not ashamed to say I knew you better.

What they’ve seen is just a beam of your sun that banishes winter.

Let us go! Though we know it’s a hopeless endeavor.

The ties that bind, they are barbed and spined, and hold us close forever.

Though there is nothing would help me come to grips withA sky that is gaping and yawning,

There is a song I woke with on my lips,As you sailed your great ship

towards the morning.Come on home. The poppies are

all grown knee-deep by now.Blossoms all have fallen,

and the pollen ruins the plow.Peonies nod in the breeze,

And as they wetly bowWith hydrocephalitic listlessness,

Ants mop up their brow.

And everything with wings is restless, aimless,

drunk and dour;Butterflies and birds collide

at hot, ungodly hours.My clay-colored motherlessness

rangily reclinesCome on home, now!

All my bones are dolorous with vines.

Pa pointed out to me, for the hundredth time tonight,

The way the ladle leads to a dirt-red bullet of light.

Squint skyward and listenLoving him, we move

within his borders:Just asterisms in the

stars’ set order.

We could stand for a century, Staring,With our heads cocked,In the broad daylight,

at this thing:

Joy, Landlocked in bodies that don’t keep

Dumbstruck with the sweetness of being,

Till we don’t be.Told: take this.

Eat this.

Told: the meteorite is the source of the light,

And the meteor’s just what we see;And the meteoroid is a stone that’s de-void of the fire that propelled it to thee.

And the meteorite is just what causes the light,

And the meteor’s how it’s perceived;And the meteoroid’s a bone thrown

from the void that lies quiet in offering to thee.

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Monkey & Bear(9:26)

Down in the green hay,Where monkey and bear usually lay,

They woke from a stable-boy’s cry.He said: “someone come quick

The horses got loose, got grass-sickThey’ll founder! Fain, they’ll die.”

What is now known by the sorrel and the roan?

By the chestnut, and the bay, and the gelding grey?

It is: stay by the gate you are given.Remain in your place, for your season.O, had the overfed dead but listened

To that high-fence, horse-sense, wisdom…

But,“Did you hear that, bear?” Said Monkey, “we’ll get out

of here, fair and squareThey’ve left the gate open wide!

“So, my bride.

“Here is my hand. Where is your paw?

Try and understand my plan, ursala.My heart is a furnaceFull of love that is just

and earnest.Now.We know that we must unlearn this

Allegiance to a life of service,And no longer answer to that heartless

Hay-monger, nor be his accomplice(That charlatan, with artless hustling!)But ursala, we’ve got to eat something,And earn our keep, while still within

The borders of the land that man has girded,

(All double-bolted and tightfisted!),Until we reach the open country,

A-steeped in milk and honey.Will you keep your fancy

clothes on, for me?Can you bear a little longer

to wear that leash?

“My love, i swear by the air i breathe:Sooner or later, you’ll bare your teeth.

“But for now, just dance, darling.C’mon, will you dance, my darling?

Darling, there’s a place for us;Can we go, before i turn to dust?

Darling there’s a place for us.

“Darling. C’mon will you dance,My darling?

The hills are groaning with excess,Like a table ceaselessly being set.

C’mon, will you dance, my darling?And we’ll get there yet.”

They trooped past the guards,Past the coops, and the fields, and the

Farmyards, all night, till finally,

The space they gainedGrew much farther than

The stone that bear threw,To mark where they’d stop for tea.

But,“walk a little faster,Don’t look backwards

“Your feast is to the east, which lies a little past the pasture.

“When the blackbirds hear tea whistling they rise and clap.

Their applause caws the kettle black.And we can’t have none of that!

Move along, bear; there, there; that’s that.”

(Though cast in plaster,Our ursala’s heart beat faster

Than monkey’s ever will.)

But still,They have got to pay the bills.

Hadn’t they?That is what the monkey would say.

So, with the courage of a clown, or a cur,

Or a kite, jerking tight at its tether,In her dun-brown gown of fur,

And her jerkin of Swansdown and leather,

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Bear would sway on her hind legs;The organ would grind dregs of song,

For the pleasureOf the children who’d shriek,Throwing coins at her feet,

Then recoiling in terror.

Sing, “dance, darling.C’mon, will you dance, my darling?

Carling, there’s a place for us;Can we go, before i turn to dust?

Darling there’s a place for us.

“Darling.C’mon, will you dance, my darling?

Keep your eyes fixed on the highest hill,Where you’ll ever-after eat your fill.

O darling…dear…mine…if you dance,Darling: i will love you still.”

*Deep in the nightShone a weak and miserly light,

Where the monkey shouldered his lamp.

Someone had told him theBear’d been wandering

a fair piece awayFrom where they were camped.

Someone had told himThe bear had been sneaking away,

To the seaside caverns, to bathe;And the thought

troubled the monkey,For he was afraid of spelunking

Down in those caves.And also afraid what theVillage people would say,

If they saw the bear in that stateLolling and splashing obscenelyWell, it seemed irrational, really,

Washing that face;Washing that matted

and flea-bit peltIn some sea-spit-shine

Old kelp dripping with brine.But monkey just laughed,

and he muttered,“when she comes back,

ursala will be bursting with prideTill i jump up!

Saying, ‘you’ve been rolling in muck!

Saying, ‘you smell of garbage and grime!’”

But far out,Far out,By now,By now

Far out, by now, bear ploughed,Because she would. Not drown:

First the outside-legs of the bearUp and fell down,

in the water, like knobby garters,

Then the outside-arms of the bearFell off, as easy as if sloughed

From boiled potatoes.Low’red in a genteel curtsy,Bear shed the mantle of her

Diluvian shoulders;And, with a sigh,

She allowed the burden of belly to drop,

Like an apronfull of boulders.if you could hold up her

Threadbare coat to the light,Where it’s worn

translucent in places,You’d see spots where,

Almost every night of the year,Bear had been mending,

Suspending that baseness.

Now her coat drags through the water,Bagging, with a life’s-worth of hunger,

Limitless minnows;In the magnetic embrace,

Balletic and glacial,Of bear’s insatiable shadow—

Left there!Left there!When bearLeft bear;

Left there,Left there,

When bearStepped clear of bear.

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Sawdust and dia-monds(9:53)

From the top of the flightOf the wide, white stairs,

Through the rest of my life,Do you wait for me there?

There’s a bell in my ears.There’s the wide, white roar.Drop a bell down the stairs.

Hear it fall forevermore.Drop a bell off of the dock.

Blot it out in the sea.Drowning mute as a rock;

Sounding mutiny.

There’s a light in the wings, hits the system of strings,

From the side, where they swing—See the wires, the wires, the wires.

And the articulation in our elbows and kneesMakes us buckle;

We couple in endless increaseAs the audience admires.And the little white dove,

Made with love, made with love;Made with glue, and a glove,

and some pliers

Swings a low sickle arc, from its perch in the dark:

Settle down, settle down, my desire.And the moment I slept, I was swept

up in a terrible tremor.Tough no longer bereft, how I shook!

And I couldn’t remember.Then the furthermost shake drove a

murthering stake in,And cleft me right down

through my centre.And I shouldn’t say so, but I knew that

it was then, or never.

Push me back into a tree.Bind my buttons with salt.Fill my long ears with bees

Praying please please please love

You ought notNo you ought not

Then the system of strings tugs at the tip of my wings

(cut from cardboard and old magazines):

Makes me warble and rise, like a sparrow.

And in the place where I stood, there is a circle of wood—

A cord or two—which you chop, and you stack in your barrow.

It is terribly good to carry water and chop wood,

Streaked with soot, heavy-booted and wild-eyed;As I crash through the rafters,

And the ropes and the pulleys trail after

And the holiest belfry burns sky-high.Then the slow lip of fire moves across

the prairie with precision,While, somewhere, with your pliers

and glue, you make your first incision.And in a moment of

almost-unbearable vision,Doubled over with the hunger of lions,

Hold me close, cooed the dove,Who was stuffed, now,

with sawdust and diamonds.

I wanted to say: Why the long face.

Sparrow, perch and play songs of long face.

Burro, buck and bray songs of long face!

Sing, I will swallow your sadness, and eat your cold clay,

Just to lift your long face;And though it may be madness,

I will take to the graveYour precious longface.

And though our bones they may break, and our souls separate

Why the long face?And though our bodies recoi

l from the grip of the soil—Why the long face?

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In the trough of the waves,Which are pawing like dogs,

Pitch we, pale-faced and grave,As I write in my log.

Then I hear a noise from the hull,Seven days out to sea.

It is that damnable bell!And it tolls—well, I believe that

it tolls—for me.It tolls for me.

Though my wrists and my waist seemed so easy to break,

Still, my dear, I’d have walked you to the very edge of the water.And they will recognise all

the lines of your faceIn the face of the daughter of the

daughter of my daughter.

Darling, we will be fine; but what was yours and mine

Appears to me a sandcastleThat the gibbering wave takes.But if it’s all just the same, then

will you say my same;Say my name in the morning, so I

know when the wave breaks.I wasn’t born of a whistle, or milked

from a thistle at twilight.No; I was all horns and thorns, sprung

out fully formed, knock-kneed and upright.

So: enough of this terror.We deserve to know light,

And grow evermore lighter and lighter.You would have seen me through,But I could not undo that desire.

From the top of the flightOf the wide, white stairs

Through the rest of my lifeDo you wait for me there?

Only skin(16:49)

And there was a booming above you,That night black airplanes

flew over the sea.And they were lowing

and shifting likeBeached whales,

Shelled snails,As you strained and you squinted to see

The retreat of their hairless and blind cavalry.

You froze in your sand shoal,Prayed for you poor soul;

Sky seemed a bread roll, soaking in a milk-bowl.

And when the bread brokeFell in bricks of wet smoke

My sleeping heart woke, and my waking heart spoke.

Then there was a silence you took

to mean something:Mean, run, sing,

For alive you will evermore be.And the plague of the greasy black

engines a-skulkingHas gone east,

While you’re left to explain them to me Released

From their hairless and blind cavalry.With your hands in your pockets,

Stubbily runningTo where i’m unfresh,

Undressed and yawning

Well, what is this craziness?This crazy talking?

You caught some small deathWhen you were sleepwalking.

It was a dark dream, darlin;It’s over. The firebreather is

beneath the clover.

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Beneath his breathing there is cold clay, forever:

A toothless hound-dog chocking on a feather.

But i took my fishing pole (fearing your fever),

Down to the swimming hole, where there grows a bitter herb

That blooms but one day a year, by the riverside

I’d bring it here: Apply it gentlyTo the love you’ve lent me.

While the river was twisting and braiding, the bait bobbed

And the string sobbed,As it cut through the hustling breeze.

And i watched how the water was kneading so neatly, Gone treacly,

Nearly slowed to a stop in this heat;Frenzy coiling flush along

the muscles beneath.

Press on me,We are restless things.

Webs of seaweed are swaddling.You call upon the dusk of the

Musk of a squid:Shot full of ink, until

you sink into your crib.

Rowing along, among the reeds, among the rushes,I heard your song,

before my heart had time to hush it!

Smell of a stonefruit being cut and being opened.

Smell of a low and of a lazy cinder smoking

And when the fire moves away,Fire moves away, son.Why would you sayI was the last one?

Scrape your knee: it is only skin.Makes the sound of violins.

When i cut your hair, and leave the birds all the trimmings,

I am the happiest woman among all women.

And the shallow water stretches as far as i can see.

Knee deep, trudging along—The seagull weeps ‘so long’—

I’m humming a threshing song—Until the night is over, hold on,Hold on;

Hold your horses back from the fickle dawn.

I have got some business out at the edge of town,Candy weighing both of my pockets down

Till i can hardly stay afloat, from the weight of them

(and knowing how the commonfolk condemn

What it is i do, to you, to keep you warm:

Being a woman. Being a woman.)

But always up the mountainside you’re clambering,

Groping blindly, hungry for anything;Picking through your pocket linings

Well, what is this?Scrap of sassafras, eh sisyphus?

I see the blossoms broke and wet after the rain.

Little sister, he will be back again.I have washed a thousand spiders down the drain.

Spiders’ ghosts hang, soaked andDangling silently, from all the blooming cherry trees,

In tiny nooses, safe from everyoneNothing but a nuisance;

gone now, dead and doneBe a woman. Be a woman.

Though we felt the spray of the waves,

We decided to stay, ‘till the tide rose too far.

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We weren’t afraid, cause we know what you are;

And you know that we know what you are.

Awful atoll. O, incalculable indiscreetness and sorrow!

Bawl bellow:Sibyl sea-cow, all done up in a bow.

Toddle and roll;Teethe an impalpable bit of leather,

While yarrow, heather and hollyhockAwkwardly molt along the shore.

Are you mine?My heart?

Mine anymore?

Stay with me for awhile.That’s an awfully real gun.

I know life will lay you down,As the lightning has lately done.

Failing this, failing this,Follow me, my sweetest friend,

To see what you anointed,In pointing your gun there.

Lay it down! Nice and slow!There is nowhere to go,

Save up;Up where the light, undiluted, is

Weaving, in a drunk dream,At the sight of my baby, out back:

Back on the patio,Watching the bats bring night in

While, elsewhere,Estuaries of wax-white

Wend, endlessly, towards seashores unmapped.

Last week, our picture windowProduced a half-word,

Heavy and hollow,Hit by a brown bird.

We stood and watched her gape like a rattlesnake

And pant and labor over every intake.

I said a sort of prayer for some rare grace,

Then thought i ought to take her to a higher place.

Said, “dog nor vulture nor cat shall toy with you,

And though you die, bird, you will have a fine view.”

Then in my hot hand, she slumped her sick weight.

We tramped through the poison oak, heartbroke and inchoate.The dogs were snapping, so you cuffed their collars

While i climbed the tree-house. Then how i hollered!

Cause she’d lain, as still as a stone, in my palm,

for a lifetime or two;Then saw the treetops, cocked her

head, and up and flew.(while back in the world

that moves, often, according toThe hoarding of these clues,

Dogs still run roughly aroundLittle tufts of finch-down.)

The cities we passed were a flickering wasteland,

But his hand, in my hand, made them hale and harmless.

While down in the lowlands, the crops are all coming;

We have everything.

Life is thundering blissful towards death

In a stampedeOf his fumbling green gentleness.

You stopped by;I was all alive. In my doorway,

we shucked and jived.And when you wept, i was gone;See, i got gone when i got wise.

But i can’t with certainty say we survived.

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Then down and downAnd down and down

And down and deeper,Stoke, without sound,The blameless flames,You endless sleeper.

Through fire below,And fire above, And fire within,

Sleep through the things that couldn’t have been,If you hadn’t have been.

And when the fire moves away,Fire moves away, son.Why would you sayI was the last one?

All my bones, they are gone, gone, gone.Take my bones, i don’t need none.

Cold, cold cupboard, lord, nothing to chew on!

Suck all day on a cherry stone.Dig a little hole not three inches roundSpit your pit in a hole in the ground.

Weep upon the spot for the starving of me!

Till up grows a fine young cherry tree.When the bough breaks,

what’ll you make for me?A little willow cabin to rest on your knee.

What’ll i do with a trinket such as this?Think of your woman,

who’s gone to the west.But i’m starving and freezing i

n my measly old bed!Then i’ll crawl across the salt flats,

to stroke your sweet head.Come across the desert

with no shoes on!I love you truly,Or i love no-one.

Fire moves away. Fire moves away, son.Why would you say i was the last one?

Clear the room! There’s a fire, a fire, a fire.

Get going,And i’m going to be

right behind you.

And if the love of a woman or two, dear,

Could move you to such heights,Then all i can do

Is do, my darling, right by you.

Cosmia(7:15)

When you ate,I saw your eyelashes.Saw them shake like

Wind on rushes.

In the cornfield,When she called me

Moths surround me.Thought they’d drown me.

And i miss your precious heart.

Dried rose petalsRedbrown circles

Framed your eyes andStained your knuckles.

And all those lonely nightsDown by the river,

You brought me bread and water (water, in.);

But though i tried so hard,My little darlin,

I couldn’t keep the night from coming in.

And all those lonely nightsDown by the river,

I was brought my bread and water

By the kith and the kin;

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Now in the quiet hour,When i am sleeping,

I cannot keep the night from coming in.

Why’ve you gone away?Gone away again?

I’ll sleep through the rest of my days,If you’ve gone away again.

Sleep through the rest of my days.

Why’ve you gone away.Seven suns away.

Can you hear me? Will you listen?Don’t come near me. Don’t go missing.

In the lissome light of evening:Help me, cosmia; i’m grieving.

And all those lonely nightsDown by the river,

You brought me bread and water(water, in.);

But though i tried so hard,My little darlin,I couldn’t keep

the night from coming in.

And all those lonely nightsDown by the river

I was brought my bread and waterBy the kith and the kin;

Now in the quiet hour,When i am sleeping,

I cannot keep the night from coming in.

*

Beneath the porch-lightWe’ve all been circling.Beat our dust hearts;Singe our flour wings.

But in the corner,Something is happening!

Wild cosmia, what have you seen?

Water were your limbs,And the fire was your hair

And then the moonlight caught your eye,

And you rose through the airWell, if you’ve seen true light,

Then this is my prayer:

Will you call me, when you get there?

And i miss your precious heart;And miss, and miss,

and miss & miss, & miss, &Miss, & miss, & miss your heart.

But release your precious heart,To its feast, for precious hearts.

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Have One on Me is the third stu-dio album by American singer-song-writer Joanna Newsom, released on February 23, 2010 via Drag City as the official follow up to the harpist’s highly acclaimed second studio re-lease, 2006’s Ys. It is a triple album produced by herself and mixed by long-time collaborators Jim O’Rourke

and Noah Georgeson, with the accompanying arrangements by Ryan Francesconi.

Have One on Me is considered to be Newsom’s most accessible work. The lyrics have been described as more straightforward than those of previous releases, though still cryptic. The albums also shows a further pro-gression of elements of her sound such as the orchestral accompaniment and the arrangements with the inclusion of diverse instruments like the tambura, the harpsi- chord and the kaval. The production also flirts with genres such as jazz and blues in some of the tracks, while adding drums and the electric guitar in others. The album is also her first since The Milk-Eyed Mender to include songs played on the piano instead of the harp. Because of

HAVE ONE ON ME(Drag City, 2010) US #75, UK #28

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health problems, Newsom’s voice was damaged during the sessions consequently affecting the overall recording process and forcing the harpist to change her singing manners.

The title of the album and its official release date were officially announced on January 12, 2010, through a comic strip. Othe wise, information about Have One on Me surfaced slowly, mostly be-ing kept secret by the press and Drag City.Advance copies of the album were only sent to music critics a few weeks before its release in an attempt to prevent a leak, since Newsom’s previous leaked months ahead of its original releas date after it was left unprotected on servers belonging to music review website Pitch fork Media. It ultimately leaked on February18, 2010.

Have One on Me received largely positive reviews by music crit-ics upon its release earning Joanna Newsom several accolades and favorable comparisons to previous singer-songwriters such as Joni Mitchell, Laura Nyro, Rickie Lee Jones and Kate Bush.In con- trast, like her previous releases before it, the album has received its share of criticism. The majority of them were made towards its triple disc format described by some critics as overly ambitious and some of its tracks length.Commercially the album earned Newsom her best chart positions yet and fared well. In the U.S. Have One on Me debuted and peaked at number 75 on the Billboard 200 and number 16 on the Top Digital Albums, selling more than 7,000 cop-ies in its first week. It also spent four consecutive weeks atop of the Folk Albums chart and peaked inside the top 10 of the Independ-ent Albums chart. In the UK it peaked at number 28, becoming her second album to reach the top 50. Additionally, Have One On Me is her first chart appearance in Canada.

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RECORDING

On March 28, 2009, Newsom performed over two hours of new material at a “secret” concert at the Fernwood Resort in Big Sur, California with fellow Nevada City singer-songwriter Mariee Sioux, under the pseudonym The Beatles’s. Those in attendance reported that about one-third of her new material was played pri-marily on piano, with a backing arrangement of banjo, violin, guitar and drums.

Plans of recording an album appeared earlier that year with the help of Francesconi and Neal Morgan, who did the percussion on the album. According to an interview made by TIME, the three of them crawled through the songs bar by bar, talking about each of their “meaning, mood and thematic stuff”.

During the recording of the album, especially when she went to lay the basic vocal tracks, it was discovered that she had lost her voice.This put a freeze on making the record, although she contin-ued to record all of the piano and the harp. By the end of the year she had since completed the album and mastered it in Tokyo.

RELEASE

On January 12, 2010, an entry cryptically titled was posted on the Drag City website where it contained a link lead- ing to a short comic strip titled “Joanna Newsom Have One on Me with a date of February 23, 2010. It was later confirmed by Spunk, Newsom’s Australian label, that the title and date represented the title and release date of Newsom’s upcoming album. The album was report-edly to be released in Australia on February 19, 2010, but it was later postponed to February 22.

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A week later ClashMusic reported that Newsom’s upcoming album would contain the four following tracks: Jack Rabbits, Ribbon Bows, Autumn and In California.

Newsom also described the album as a “cross between her last two” On January 22 of that same month, less than three days after the interview, ClashMusic removed the article and the interview, citing that “the information given was not part of any exclusive in-terview with, or authorized, by Joanna Newsom and that the words expressed were solely those of the writer.” Also, according to the magazine, “none of the quotes should be credited to Ms. Newsom”. They concluded by apologizing to “Ms. Newsom and her record company for any distress caused by the article.” That same day, NME had reported that the album would contain three discs.

On January 26, the album was made available for pre-order. Pitchfork Media also reported that Drag City revealed the album cover, which the webzine described as an “utilitarian cover art, a far cry from the fancy portrait that adorned Ys”. It was also con- firmed that Have One on Me would be a triple album. At last it was reported that Have One on Me would be released worldwide from February 23, including Australia.

Less than a week later, Drag City revealed a new album cover, confirming rumors that the black one released before containing only Joanna’s name and the album title was only provisory and not the final design. Pitch- fork Media described it as a “picture of Ms. Newsom lounging amidst too many antiques and animal prints. She looks comfortable.”

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On February 8, Japanese website Metropolis reported that Have One on Me would be released in Japan on March 4. Also accord- ing to the article although “details and samples of the new album have been kept closely under wraps”, there was “an invite-only listening party for press last week” that “revealed Have One on Me to be Newsom’s magnum opus”.

Advance copies were not sent to critics in an effort to avoid a leak of the album according to Uncut; Newsom’s previous album, Ys was leaked two months before its original release when it was left unprotected on servers belonging to music review website Pitchfork Media; However, Have One on Me leaked and became available on P2P networks and BitTorrent on February 18, just days before its official release date.

PROMOTION AND TOURING

To promote the album, Drag City streamed three tracks, start-ing January 26 and ending on February 15, with each one of them being streamed during seven days. 81 was the first to be streamed at the label’s website and the resulting wave of web traffic overloaded their website. On February 2, the label streamed another new track via its website, “Good Intentions Paving Company”.

Pitchfork Media awarded the song a grade of 9 out of 10, and it received the “Best New Music” tag. The reviewer compared News-om favorably to Rickie Lee Jones and suggested that the song “may be the most humanizing song we’ve heard from News- om”, aside calling it a “rare thing, then an unapologetic love song that feels, you know, new.”.

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On February 9, the nine-minute Kingfisher became the last one released. Aside this and touring in support of the album, Joanna Newsom performed Soft as Chalk at Jimmy Fallon’s Late Night With Jimmy Fallon on March 6, 2010. Newsom performed 81 and Jackrabbits on Later with Jools Holland on May 4, 2010.

Newsom also appeared on the cover of Under the Radar maga-zine for its May 2010 issue and in the August 2010 issue of Mojo Magazine.

On August 12, Newsom performed “You and Me, Bess” and 81 on Jimmy Kimmel Live. The performance of You and Me, Bess was filmed in black-and-white. In support of the album, she also performed in fes- tivals such as the Green Man Festival and All Tomorrow Parties, the latter curated by Matt Groening also earned her a Simpsons cartoon by the cartoonist himself.

During the tour, Newsom alongside Fleet Foxes’s Robin Pec-knold performed a cover of Kid Rock’s Picture to critical acclaim. Also, her song On a Good Day was covered by Pecknold and by punk-rock icon Billy Bragg for The Voice Project. Joanna Newsom also performed this song, incorporating a new instrumental section, in December of the same year on the The Late Show with David Letterman.

COMMERCIAL PERFORMANCE

In the week it was released, Have One on Me reached the top 10 of online music stores such as Amazon and the iTunes in the U.S.. As a consequence, the album debuted and peaked at number 16 on the Top Digital Albums chart and at number 7 on the Independent Albums chart.

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On the Billboard 200 it debuted and peaked at number 75, sell-ing more than five thousand copies, making it not only her highest charting album, but also her best first week sales yet. It also de-buted and peaked atop of the Folk Albums, making Have One on Me her second album to reach the top spot of a Billboard chart. A week later it fell to number 104 at the first and stayed another week at the top of the latter, becoming, so far, her most successful chart performance.

On its third week, the album fell to number 140, though it con-tinued to top the Folk albums chart. Have One on Me spent a total of four weeks inside the Billboard 200 and it charted inside of the top 40 and the top 5 of the Independent albums and Folk albums charts, respectively for a few more weeks.

By the end of the year it had sold more than 50,000 copies in the U.S. alone. The album also became her first chart appearance in Canada, debuting and peaking at number 80.

In Europe, the album also became Newsom’s highest chart ap-pearance to date in the majority of the territories, where it peaked at number 46 on the continent’s overall chart.

In the UK it debuted and peaked at number 28, her second al-bum to chart inside the top 50, since Ys peaked at number 41 back in 2006. In Ireland, it debuted and peaked at number 24, falling to number 32 a week after its debut. The album peaked inside the top 20 of the Norwegian Album Charts, and reached the top 100 of others such as the Swiss’s, Netherlands’s and the Belgium’s albums chart. The album charted lower than its predecessor in France, where it debuted and peaked at number 171.

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CRITICAL RESPONSE

Have One on Me received positive reviews upon its release based on an aggregate score of 85 out of 100 at Metacritic, indicat-ing Universal Acclaim. Most of the reviews made note of the sprawl-ing nature of, and the varied styles present in the album, and that whilst a longer album than Ys the orchestral arrangements are scaled-back and less ornate in comparison to Van Dyke Parks’ ar-rangements on that album.

The Observer noted that just as Ys was a considerately more ambitious album than The Milk-Eyed Mender, Have One on Me rep-resented a “correspondingly Knievel-like vault”.

The Wire magazine as well as several other reviews noted the ex-pansion of Newsom’s musical palette to include instruments such as tambura and kaval, whilst other critics includ- ing Pitchfork Media drew comparison to Joni Mitchell’s 1970s material. They also made note of the maturing of Newsom’s voice, particularly Ann Powers’ review in the Los Angeles Times and Simon Vozick-Levinson in Entertainment Weekly.

Anthony Carew of About.com gave the album 5 stars calling Have One on Me “colossal” and “all of the tremors and squeaks of her original screech have been smoothed out, her polished-stone voice rolling syllables into honeyed slurs”, aside concluding that “armed with more beautiful singing, more rich orchestration, and more open emotion, there’s not a difficult note on here; it’s two hours amounting to a staggering portrait of an artist defiantly staking her claim as one of the greatest of the 21st century.”

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Philip Cosores of Consequence of Sound also gave the album a perfect score claiming that “records like Have One on Me are why [perfect scores] exist”. The reviewer also wrote favorably about its production and songwriting referring to them as “emotional mo-ments, moments you can’t help but imagine being moved to tears, even if you are not actually moved to do so”.

John Mulvey of Uncut gone even further writing that Have One on Me “sounds very much like a second masterpiece: a dif-ferent kind of epic to Ys, and one with enough hooks and charms to ensnare at least a few Newsom agnostics” whist Louis Pattison of BBC felt that “as an album, it is huge, sometimes overwhelming – but such is the strength and individuality of Newsom’s vision, it seems almost inconceivable she could produce anything unremark-able”. The New York Times’s Jon Pareles pointed that she “has discovered how to open up her music: to let it whisper and swell, to be swept into the purely musical pleasures of an ingenious arrange-ment or to let simplicity and silence speak for her.” The Irish Times gave the album 5 stars assuming that although “triple albums are a risk, Newsom pulls this off beautifully.”

Allison Stewart of The Washington Post called Have One on Me “her magnum opus, a three-disc set being likened to a freak-folk Sandinista!, though it feels more like a musical Ulysses.” musi-cOMHs Darren Harvey awarded the album 5 stars recognized that it is “winding, long-winded, densely poetic, and often challenging”, but “never tedious or self-indulgent”, an opinion also shared by Dan Cairns of The Times. James Reed of the Boston Globe wrote favorably about its production stating that “she could have easily overstuffed these songs, like the dizzying album cover, but instead

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Newsom keeps a tight grip on the music’s dramatic arcs. Songs tend to open with a simple melody on harp or piano before plummeting into countless rabbit holes”.Mark Richardson of Pitchfork gave the album 9.2 out of 10 claiming that it was “striking how much Have One on Me feels like its own thing” in comparison to previous works. Paste Magazine’s Jeff Vrabel referred to it as a “panoramic dream-world” and wrote that “Have One on Me is packed with magic.”

Jim Scott of Under the Radar awarded the album 9 out of 10 stating that Newsom “has never been one of those artists who leave the listener wanting more, knowing that there’s more to give.” To him “the mas- sive amount of material contained in Have One on Me will take a long time to digest. Perhaps as long as it takes her to produce another album”.Drowned In Sound also gave the same rat-ing and praised Newsom’s vocals and lyrics, while the former being described as “winsome and technically much improved” and the lat-ter being pointed as “one of her strongest points.” To the reviewer the album is “for now, a stunning and ambitious piece of work; one for the ages”.

Sputnikmusic rated the album 41⁄2 stars out of 5 commenting that “it’s been a long time since an album like this was released: an album that is intensely personal even if you can’t relate to the lyrics, even if you’ve never been in love, even if you’ve never lost something, even if you’ve never really felt alive.” To Chris Parkin of Yahoo! Have One on Me is “nothing short of remarkable”, while No Ripcord awarded the album a full score, a second for Newsom, referring to it as “one of the finest albums of this, or any, year.”

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vRenowned Music critic Piero Scaruff12 affirmed that “ex-hausting and exhilarating, this album pushed Newsom to a higher orbit than any of her contemporary singer- songwriter”; Ultimately awarding the record an eight and a half out of ten rating.

Spin’s Andy Beta expressed that Newsom “gives what few art-ists can deliver: a self-contained world of warmth, crystalline detail, and intimacy that lies far beyond a Twitter feed.” in his 4 star re-view. Q Magazine gave the same rating and shared a similar opin-ion commenting that “Have One on Me is a record so richly involving that it promises to throw up fresh delights weeks, or even months, down the line.”

NME stated in its 8/10 review that “most bands don’t make that many great songs in their whole darned career.” Simmy Richman of The Independent described it as “a monumental work in more ways than one.” Will Dean of The Guardian pointed that “at two-hours-plus, it’s a record that demands concentration to appreciate its splatterings of beauty. But pour yourself a glass and listen, be-cause they don’t make them like this too often.”

Will Hermes of Rolling Stone awarded the album 31⁄2 stars out of 5 praising the lyrics and believing that it “firmly establishes her as a singer-songwriter to be reckoned with”, while the German ver-sion of the same magazine gave Have One on Me 41⁄2 stars and placed Newsom as the cover story of its march issue. Giving it 31⁄2 stars, Heather Phares of Allmusic commented that “the first disc presents Newsom’s biggest depar- tures”, but that “the album’s cross between The Milk-Eyed Mender and Ys isn’t always greater than the sum of its parts”. Andy Battaglia of The A.V. Club gave it a B grade and wrote that “Have One on Me doesn’t hold out any

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clear organizational structure to cinch it all together. Or at least it hasn’t yet”, while Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune in his 21⁄2 out of 4 stars review commented that “history tells us that most triple albums could’ve benefited from some pruning, and Have One on Me is no exception.”As with Newsom’s other studio albums, Have One on Me has received criticism and mixed to negative reviews. Slant Magazine’s Matthew Cole rated it 2 stars out of 5. Cole said it was “remarkable how little narrative arc develops either within or between songs,” and that most of the album plays out with “mo-ments of inspired performance scattered haphazardly throughout tracks that just don’t feel like they’ve been thought through.”

He went on to call the record “a strange, and strangely preten-tious mess: an album pitted deep in the psychic world of stories that nonetheless can’t figure out when it should begin, when it should end, or which parts are even worth the audience’s atten-tion.” Matthew Fiander of PopMatters gave the album 4 out of 10 points and described the songs as formless, although he rec-ognized that there were standout tracks, and some of them came at least close of others songs by Newsom such as Only Skin. He also expressed disappointment, commenting that “it’s too bad re-ally, that Have One on Me is so overdone because there’s a decent album hidden somewhere in there. It’s an album the Newsom we saw in 2006 would have found, formed, and made shine”. In con-trast, Zach Schonfeld of the same website has been more positive towards the album while reviewing one of her concerts, describ-ing it as “the closest Newsom will come to a Blood on the Tracks a confessional opus, straight from the gut.”

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Easy(6:04)

Easy, easyMy man and me

We could rest and remain here, easily

We are tested and pained byWhat’s beyond our bed

We are blessed and sustainedBy what is not said

No-one knows what is comingOr who will harvest what we have sewn

Or how I’ve been dulling and dumbingIn the service of the heart alone

Or how I am worn to the boneBy the river

And in the river made of lightI’m your little life-giver

I will give my life

Haven’t you seen what I’ve seenDon’t you know what you ought to do

I was born to loveAnd I intend to love you

Down in the valley Where the fields are green,

Watch my luck turn, fro and to pluckEvery last daisy clean

Till only I may love you

I am easy Easy to keepHoney, you please me

Even in your sleepBut my arms want to carry

My heart wants to holdTell me your worries

I want to be told

Sit and see how the fogFrom the port in the bay

Lays like snowAt the foot of the Roanoke

Hear the frog going courtingTill the day he croaks

Saying even then

How there is light in the riverAnd there’s a river made of light

Come on you little life-giverGive your life

Who asked you Who asked youIf you want to be loved by me

Who died and made you in chargeOf who loves whoAll the livelong day

If I have my way, I will love you

But One can’t carry the weightOr change the fate of Two

I’ve been waiting for a breakHow long’s it gonna take

Let me love you

How about itHow about what I have to sayHow about that livelong day

How am I gonna stayHere without you

Easy, easyYou must not fear

You must meet me, to see meI am barely here

But, like a Bloody MarySeen in the mirrorSpeak my name

And I appearSpeak my name

And I appear SpeakAnd I appear

Have One On Me(11:02)

From the courtyard I floated inAnd watched it go down

Heard the cup dropThought, “Well, that’s why they keep

them around”The blackguard sat hard, down

With no head on him nowAnd I felt so bad

‘Cause I didn’t know howTo feel bad enoughTo make him proud

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By the time you read thisI will be so far away

Daddy longlegs, how in the worldAm I to be expected to stay In the night

In the night, you may hear me callPa, stay your hand

And steel your resolveStay where you are

So long and tall

Here’s Lola, ta da!, to doHer famous Spider Dance for you

Lighten up your pocketsShake her skirts and scatter, thereA shrieking six-legged millionaire

With a blight in his sockets

Miss MontezThe Countess of Lansfeld

Appealed to the King of BavariaSaying, “Pretty papa if you are my friend

Mister daddy longlegs, they are at it again

Can I see you”

Poor Lola, a tarantula’s mountingCountess Lansfeld’s handsome brassiereWhile they all cheer

And the old king fell from graceWhile Lola fled

To save face and her career

You caught a fly, floating byWait for him to drown in the dust

Drown in the dust of other fliesWhereby the machine is run

And the deed is doneHeaven has no word

For the way you and your friends

Have treated poor LouisMay God save your poor soul, Lola

But there is nothing I adoreApart from that whore’s black heart

Well, doesn’t that just beat allMiss Gilbert

Called to CastlemaineBy the silver dollarAnd the gold glitter

Well, I’ve seen lotsBut never, in a million yearsWould think to see you, here

Though the long roadBegins and ends with you

I cannot seem to make amends with you, Louis

When we go outThey’re bound to see you with me

At night, I walk in the park with a whip

Between the lines of the whispering Jesuits

Who are poisoning you against meThere’s a big black

spider hanging over my doorCan’t go anywhere, anymore

Tell me, are you with me

I called to you, several timesWhile the change took placeAnd then arrived, all night

And I died

But all these songsWhen you and I are long gone

Will carry onMud in your eye

You asked my hand Hired a band

“In your heart is all that you needAsk and you will receive” it is said

I threw my bouquetAnd I knocked ‘em dead

Bottle of white, bottle of redHelpless as a child

When you held me in your armsAnd I knew that no other

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Could ever love me as you lovedLove me as you loved

But help me I’m leaving

I remember everythingDown to the sound of you shaving

The scrape of your razorThe dully-abrading black hair

That remainedWhen you clutched at me

That night I came upstairs, half-deadAnd, in your kindness

you put me straightawayIn the cupboard with a bottle of champagne

And then, later on a trainIt was dark out, I was half-dead

I saw a star fall into the skyLike a chunk of thrown coal

As if god himself spat like a cornered rat

I really want you to do this for meWill you have one on me

It was dark, I was drunk and half-deadAnd we slept, knocking heads

Sitting up in the star-smoking airKnocking heads like buoys

Don’t you worry for meWill you have one on me

Meanwhile, I will raise my own glassTo how you made me fast

and expendableAnd I will drink to

your excellent healthAnd your cruelty

Will you have one on meHelpless as a child

When you held me in your armsAnd I knew that no other

could ever love me

From the courtyard, I floated inAnd then I watched it go down

Heard the cup dropThought, “Well, that’s why they keep them around”The blackguard sat hard

Down with no head on him nowAnd I felt so bad

‘Cause I didn’t know how to feel bad enough

To make him proud

Well daddy longlegs, are youDaddy longlegs, are you

Daddy longlegs, are you proud

‘81’(3:52)

I found a little plot of landIn the garden of Eden

It was dirt, and dirt is all the same

I tilled it with my two handsAnd I called it my very own

There was no one to dispute my claim

Well, you’d be shocked at the state of things

The whole place had just cleared right out

It was hotter than hell, so I laid me by a spring

For a spell as naked as a trout

The wandering eye that I have caught

Is as hot as a wandering sunBut I will want for nothing more,

in my gardenStart again, in my hardening to every

heart but one

Meet me in the garden of EdenBring a friend

We are gonna have ourselves a timeWe are gonna have a garden party

It’s on me, no, sirree, it’s my dime

We broke our hearts in the war between

St. George and the dragonBut both, in equal part are

welcome to come alongI’m inviting everyone

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Farewell to loves that I have knownEven muddiest waters run

Tell me, what is meant by sin, or none in a garden

Seceded from the union in the year of A.D. 1

The unending amends you’ve madeAre enough for one life Be done

I believe in innocence, little darlin Start againI believe in everyoneI believe, regardless

I believe in everyone

Good Intentions Paving Company(7:02)

Twenty miles left to the showHello, my old country, hello

Stars are just beginning to appearAnd I have never in my

life before been here

And it’s my heart, not me, who cannot drive

At which conclusion you arrivedWatching me sit here, bolt uprightAnd cry for no good reason at the

Eastering sky

And the tilt of this strange nationAnd the will to remain for the duration

Waving the flagFeeling it drag

Like a bump on a bump on a log, babyLike I’m in a fistfight with the fog, baby

Step, ball-change, and a pirouette

And I regret, I regretHow I said to you, honey,

just open your heartWhen I’ve got trouble even

opening a honey jarAnd that, right there, is where we are

And I’ve been ‘fessing, double-fastAddressing questions nobody askedI’ll get this joy off of my chest, at lastAnd I will love you till the noise has

long since passedI did not mean to shout, just drive

Just get us out, dead or aliveThe road’s too long to mention

Lord, it’s something to seeLaid down by the Good

Intentions Paving Company

All the way to the thing we’ve been playing at, darling

I can see that you’re wearing your staying-hat, darling

For the time being, all is wellWon’t you love me a spell

This is blindness, beyond all conceivingWhile behind us, the road is leaving

And leaving, and falling backLike a rope gone slack

Well, I saw straightaway that the lay was steep

But I fell for you, honey, easy as falling asleepAnd that, right there is the course I keep

And no amount of talkingIs going to soften the fall

But, like after the rain Step out of the overhang, that’s all

It had a nice ring to itWhen the old opry house rang

So with a solemn auld lang syneSealed, delivered, I sang

And there is hesitationAnd it always remains

Concerning you, meAnd the rest of the gang

And in our quiet hourI feel I see everything

And am in love with the hookUpon which everyone hangs

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And I know you meant to show the extent

To which you gave a goddangYou ranged real hot and real cold

But I’m soldI am at home on that range

And I do hate to foldRight here, at the top of my game

When I’ve been trying with my whole heart and soul

To stay right here, in the right laneBut it can make you feel over and old

Lord, you know it’s a shameWhen I only want for you to pull over and hold me

Till I can’t remember my own name

No Provenance(6:25)

Allelu, alleluI have died happy

And lived to tell the tale to youI have slept for forty yearsAnd woke to find me gone

I woke safe and warm in your armsIn your arms, your arms, in your arms

Not informed of the natural lawSquatting, lordly, on a stool, in a stall

We spun gold clear out of strawAnd, when our bales of

bullion were storedYou burned me like a barn

I burned safe and warm in your armsIn your arms, your arms

I’m afraid of the Big ReturnThere’s a certain conversation lost

And that loss incurredWith nobody remaining

To register who had passed this wayIn the night, in the middle of the night

Negating their grace and their sightTill only I remember, or mark

How we had our talk

We took our rideSo that there was no-one home

And the lights of RomeFlickered and died

And, what’s more I believe that you knew it, too

I think you saw their flaresAnd kept me safely unawares

In your arms, your arms, in your arms

The grass was tall, and strung with burrs

I essayed that high sashayWhich in my mind, was my way

You hung behind, in yoursAnyhow, she did not neigh

I do not knowWhat drew our eyes to hers

That little black mare did not stirTill I lay down in your arms

Poor old dirty little dog-size horseSwaying and wheezingAs a matter of course

Swaying and wheezingAs a matter of pride

That poor old nagNot four palms wide

Had waited a long time

Coated in saltBuckled like a ship

Run foul of the fenceIn the middle of the night

She’d sprung upNo provenance

Bearing the whites of her eyesAnd you, with your

‘arrangement’ with FateNodded sadly at her lame assault

On that steady old gateHer faultlessly etiolated fishbelly-face

The muzzle of a ghostAnd, pretty Johnny Appleseed

Via satellite feedTell us, who was it that

you then loved the mostPretty Johnny AppleseedLeave a trail that leads

Straight back down to the farmLay me down safe and

warm in your armsIn your arms

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Baby Birch(9:30)

This is the song for Baby BirchOh I will never know you

And at the back of what we’ve doneThere is the knowledge of you

Well I wish we could take every pathI could spend a hundred

years adoring youYes, I wish we could take every path

Because I hated to close the door on you

Do you remember staring up at the stars

So far away in their bulletproof carsWhen we heard the rushing,

slow intakeOf the dark, dark water, and the engine breaks

And I saidHow about them engine breaks

And, if I should die before I wakeWill you keep an eye on Baby Birch

Because I’d hate to see her make the same mistakes

When it was darkI called and you came

When it was darkI saw shapes

When I see starsI feel, in your hand

And I see starsAnd I reel, again

Well mercy me, I’ll be goddamnedIt’s been a long, long time

Since I last saw you

And I have never known the planIt’s been a long, long time

How are you

Your eyes are greenYour hair is goldYour hair is blackYour eyes are blue

I closed the ranks, and I doubled backBut, you know, I hated to close

the dog-gone door on you

We take a walk along the dirty lakeHear the goose cussing

at me over her eggsYou poor little cousin,

I don’t want your dregsA little baby fussing all over my legs

There is a blacksmithAnd there is a shepherd

And there is a butcher boyAnd there is a barber, who’s cutting

And cutting away at my only joyI saw a rabbit

As slick as a knifeAnd as pale as a candlestick

And I had thought it’d be harder to doBut I caught her, and skinned her quick

Held her thereKicking and mewling

Upending, unspooling,unsung and blueTold her “wherever you go

Little runaway bunny I will find you”And then she ran

As they’re liable to do

Be at peace, baby And be goneBe at peace, baby And be gone

On a Good Day(1:49)

Hey hey hey, the end is nearOn a good day you can see

the end from hereBut I won’t turn back, now,

though the way is clearI will stay for the remainder

I saw a life, and I called it mineI saw it, drawn so sweet and fine

And I had begun to fill in all the linesRight down to what we’d name her

Our nature does not change by willIn the winter, ‘round the ruined mill

The creek is lying, flat and stillIt is water though it’s frozen

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So across the yearsand miles, and throughOn a good day, you can

feel my love for youWill you leave me be,

so that we can stay trueTo the path that you have chosen

You and Me, Bess(7:13)

We picked our wayDown to the beach

Watching the wavesDragging out of our reach Tangling tails

Like a sodden sheetDangling entrails

From the gut of the sea

Hoarding our mealsAlfalfa and rolls Trying not to catch

The cold eyes of the gullsI hope Mother Nature

has not overheardThough, she doles out

hurt like a puking bird

We stayed for the winterNo-one told us

About the laws of the landI hold my own

But you, with your hungerYou, on the other handMake yourself known

And when we were foundI know we both grieved

My heart made the soundOf snow falling from eaves

You and me, BessWe were as thick as thieves

So I swore, nonethelessUp and down, it was only me

So they took me awayAnd after some time Studying my case

Must have made up their mindsBy the time you realized I was dying

It must have been too lateI believe you were not lying

It is the dayI wake with my earsCocked up like a gun

Like every day, of courseYanked by my wrists

To the sugar-front courtyardNow tell me, what have I doneIt seems I have stolen a horse

I step to the gallows

Who do you think you areArching your hooves like a crane

In the shallow gutterThat lines the boulevards

Crowded with folksWho just stare as I hang

It’s all the sameKindness comes over me

What was your nameIt makes no differenceI’m glad that you came

Forever, I’ll listen to your glad neighing

In California(8:42)

My heart became a drunken runtOn the day I sunk in this shunt

To tap me cleanOf all the wonder

And the sorrow I have seenSince I left my home

My home, on the old Milk LakeWhere the darkness does fall so fast

It feels like some kind of mistakeJust like they told you it would

Just like the Tulgeywood

When I came into my landI did not understand

Neither dry rot, nor the burn pileNor the bark-beetle, nor the dry well

Nor the black bear But there is anotherWho is a little older

When I broke my boneHe carried me up from the riverside

To spend my life In spitting-distanceOf the love that I have known

I must stay here, in an endless eventide

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And if you come and see meYou will upset the order

You cannot come and see meFor I set myself apart

But when you com and see me In California

You cross the border of my heart

Well, I have sown untidy furrowsAcross my soul

But I am still a cowardContent to see my garden grow

So sweet and fullOf someone else’s flowers

Sometimes I can almost feel the powerSometimes I am so in love with you

Like a little clock that trembles on the edge of the hour

Only ever calling out “Cuckoo, cuckoo”

When I called youYou, little one In a bad way

Did you love me Do you spite meTime will tell if I can be wellAnd rise to meet you rightly

While, moving across my landBrandishing themselvesLike a burning branch

Advance the tallow-coloredwalleyed deer

Quiet as gondoliersWhile I wait all night, for you in California

Watching the fox pick off my goldfishFrom their sorry, golden state

And I am no longerAfraid of anything

Save the life that, here, awaits

I don’t belong to anyoneMy heart is heavy as an oil drum

And I don’t want to be aloneMy heart is yellow as an ear of corn

And I have torn my soul apartFrom pulling artlessly with fool com-

mandsSome nights I just never go to sleep

at allAnd I stand

Shaking in my doorway like a sentinelAll alone

Bracing like the bow upon a shipAnd fully abandoning

Any thought of anywhereBut home, my home

Sometimes I can almost feel the powerAnd I do love you

Is it only timing that has made it such a dark hour

Only ever chiming out “Cuckoo, cuckoo”

My heart, I wear you downI know, gotta think straight

Keep a clean plateKeep from wearing down

If I lose my headJust where am I going to lay it

For it has half-ruined me to be hanging around

Here, among the daphne blooming out of the big brown

I am native to it, but I’m overgrownI have choked my roots

on the earth, as rich as roeHere, down in California

Jackrabbits(4:23)

I was tired of being drunkMy face cracked like a joke

So I swung through hereLike a brace of jackrabbitsWith their necks all broke

I stumbled at the door with my bootI knocked against the jamb

I scrabbled at your chest, like a muteWith my fists of ham

Trying to tell youThat I am telling, I canI can love you again

Love you again

I’m squinting towards the EastMy faith makes me a dope

But you can take my hand in the darkness, darling

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Like a length of ropeI shaped up overnight, you know

The day after she diedWhen I saw my heart

And I’ll tell you, darling, it was open wide

What with telling you I amTelling you I can

I can love you againLove you again

And it can have no bounds, you knowIt can have no end

You can take my hand in the darkness, darlingWhen you need a friend

And it can change in shape, or formBut never change in size

The water, it runs deep, my darlingWhere it don’t run wide

The feather of a hawk was boundBound around my neckA poultice made of fig

The eager little vultures peckedAnd a verse I read in jestIn Matthew, spoke to me

Said “There’s a flame that movesLike a low-down pest”

And says “You will be free”

Only, tell me that I canTell me that I can

I can love you againLove you again

Love you againLove you again

Love you again…

Go Long(8:03)

Last night again you were in my dreamSeveral expendable limbs

were at stakeYou were a prince, spinning rims

All sentiments Indian-given and half-baked

I was brought in on a palanquinMade of the many bodies

of beautiful womenBrought to this place, to be examined

Swaying on an elephant, a princess of India

We both want the very same thingWe are praying I amthe one to save you

But you don’t evenown your ownviolence

Run away from home, your heard is still blue

With the loneliness of you mighty menWith your jaws, and fists,

and guitars and pensAnd your sugarlip, but

I’ve never been to the firepitsWith you mighty men

Who made you this wayWho made you this way

Who is going to bear your beautiful children

Do you think you can just stopWhen you’re ready for a change

Who will take care of youWhen you’re old and dying

You burn in the MekongTo prove your worth Go long, go long

Right over the edge of the earthYou have been wronged Tore up since

birth You have done harmOthers have done worse

Will you tuck your shirtWill you leave it loose

You are badly hurt You’re a silly goose

You are caked in mudAnd in blood, and worse

Chew your bitter cudGrope your little nurse

Do you know why myankles are bound in gauze

Sickly dressage, a princess of Kentucky

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In the middle of the woods which were the probable causeWe danced in the lodge

like two panting monkeys

I will give you a call, for one last hurrah

And if this tale is tall, forgive my scrambling

But you keep palming along the wallMoving at a blind crawl,

but always rambling

Wolf-spider, crouch in your funnel nestIf I knew you, once, now I know you lessIn the sinking sand,

where we’ve come to restHave I had a hand in your loneliness

When you leave me alone in this old palace of yours

It starts to get to me, I take to walkingWhat a woman does is open doors

And it is not a question of locking or unlocking

Well, I have never seen such a terrible room

Gilded with the gold teeth of the women who loved you

Now, though I die, Magpie, this I bequeath

By any other name, a Jay is still blue

With the loneliness of you mighty menWith your mighty kiss

that might never never endWhile, so far away,

in the seat of the WestBurns the fount of the heat of that loneliness

There’s a man who only will speak in code

Backing slowly, slowly down the roadMay he master everythingThat such men may know

About loving, and then letting go

Occident(5:31)

Mercy me, the night is longTake my pen to write you this song

Lord, is it harder to carry onOr to know when you are done

All my life, I’ve felt as thoughI’m inside a beautiful memory

Replaying with the sound turned down low

Long-life, show your faceSlow-heart, curb your taste

Smoke me out of my hiding placeLong-life, state your case

What in the world are we waiting forBuilding glowing cities along the shore

Where the wind batters inBaiting my kin like a matador

So much value, placed uponWhat lies just beyond our plans

Waving my handkerchiefRunning along, till the end of the sand

Long-life, speak your nameI’m so tired of the guessing game

But, something is movingJust out of frame

Slow-heart, brace and aim

Breaching slowly, across the seaOne mast, a flash, like

the stinger of a beeTo take you away A swarming fleet

Is gonna take you from me

The universe is getting looseSodden spread from

some leaden disuse Rushing, unhinged, toward diminishing lights

Like a headless caboose

I’ll wait for you alongside the oceanAnd make do with my no-skin

But then, Long-life, will you let me inAnd then, Slow-heart,

are you gonna know him

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Long-life, speak your nameI wait, while I decry the waitAnd when I die, may I relate

Slow heart, congregate

To leave your home and your familyFor some distortion of property

Well, darling, I can’t goBut you may stay

Here, with me

Soft as Chalk(6:29)

So, so long agoAnd so far away

When time was just a lineThat you fed me

When you wanted to stay

We’d talk as soft as chalkTill morning came, as pale as a pearl

No time, no, no timeNow, I have got

all the time in the world

Say, honey, did you belong to meTell me, honey, was your

heart at rest when, darlingAll the mourning

doves were howling usA song of love’s oh god-awful

lawlessness, lawlessnessSay, honey, did you belong to me

Tell me, honey, did I pass your testI lay, as still as death, until the dawnWhereupon I wrested from your god-

awful lawlessness, lawlessness

I roam around the tidy groundsOf my dappled sanatorium

Coatless, I sit amongst the moles, adriftAnd I dote upon my pinesap gum

And the light, through the pines in brassy tines

Lays over me, dim as rumAnd thick as molasses,

and so time passesAnd so, my heart, tomorrow comes

I feel you, leaningOut back with the crickets

Loyal heart marking the soon-ness darkness

Tonight, still the mourning dovesWill summon us their song

Of love’s neverdoneing lawlessness, lawlessness

While, over and overRear up, stand down, lay round

Trying to sound out or guess thereasons

To sleep like a soldier, without restBut there is no treason

Where there is onlylawlessness, lawlessness

In the last weekOf the last year I was aware

I took a blind shot, across the creekAt the black bear

When he roused me in the nightAnd left me cowering with my light

Calling outWho is thereWho’s thereWho is there

I watched you sleepRepeating my prayer

Give love a little shoveAnd it becomes terrorAnd now I am calling

In a sadness beyond angerAnd beyond fear

Who is thereWho’s thereWho is there

I glare and nodLike the character, God

Bearing down upon the houses and lawns

I knew a little bit,But, darling, you were it

And, darling, now it is long goneSweetheart, in your clean, bright start

Back there, behind a hill, and a dellAnd a state line or two,

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I’ll be thinking of youYes, I’ll be thinking and

be wishing you wellWe land, I stand, but I wait

for the sound of the bellI have to catch a cab and

my bags are at the carouselAnd then Lord, just then, time alone will only tell

You morning dove

Esme(7:56)

I can feel a differenceToday, a difference

All of us, in our tentsFearing god like a mistress

We lay on the rocks, in the sunWatching you and your mama row in

I sat up and blinked when you appeared

So pale you were nearly clear

Later, I stumbled to my bedAll alone in the branches

I laid in the darkThinking about all of

my friends and their changes

And I do not know if you knowJust what you have doneYou are the sweetest one

I have ever laid my eyes upon

It’s a beautiful townWith the rain coming down

Blackberry, rosemaryJimmy-crack-corn

You’ve got the run of the placeNow that you’re running around

And may kindnessKindness, kindness abound

In this hour of our livesHour of effortless plentyHow do we know which

parts of our heartsWant what with such base generosity

Taking so many photographs, so amazed

We’ve never seen a baby so newly bornAnd, when the bulbs do

flash as bright as morningThe crowd keeps on gathering

like an electric storm

The phantom of loveMoves among us at willEach phantom-limb lost

Has got an angel So confusedLike the wagging bobbed-tail

of a bulldogKindness, kindness prevails.

Kindness prevails Ties and railsTies and rails fall into line bearing kindness

Where will you go, if not hereWhat will you say

when you write to us

And this is a world of terrible hardship, everywhereAnd I search for words

to set you at easeBut there, in the looking-glass,

a kite is soaringStilling my warring heart and my

trembling knees

Clean as a breezeBright as the day

All of the people gather to say“Sweet Esme! Sweet Esme!

Oh, oh, oh!”

I believe love will always surround youBrave as a bear with a heart rare and true

But if you are scared, if you are blueI have prepared this small song for you

“Sweet Esme! Sweet Esme! Oh, oh, oh!”

“Sweet Esme! Sweet Esme! Oh, oh, oh!”

“Sweet Esme! Esme!“Sweet Esme! Sweet Esme!

Oh, oh, oh!”

i

- 52 -

Autumn(8:02)

Driven through by her own swordSummer died last night, alone

Even the ghosts huddled up for warmthAutumn has come to my hometown

Friendly voices, dead and gone,Singing, Star of the country downEven the ghosts help raise the barn

Here, now, in my hometown

When, out of the massing that bodes and bides in the cold west

Flew a waxwing, who froze and died against my breast

And all the while, rain, like a weed in the tideSwans and lists, down on the gossiping lawns

Saying tsk tsk tsk

I may have changed, it’s hard to gaugeTime won’t account for how I’ve aged

Would I could tie your lying tongueWho says that leaving keeps you young

I have got no controlOver my heart, over my mind

Over the hills, the rainclouds rollI’ll winter here, wait for a sign

To cast myself out, over the waterRiven like a wishbone

You’d hardly guessI was my own mother’s daughter

I ain’t naturally given to roamAnd I lay low, when I return

And I move like a gurneyWhose wheels are squeaking

Alone, here in my homeAnd I laugh when you speak of my

pleasure-seekingAmong the tall pines, along the lay-lines

Here, where the loon keensThere, where the moon leans

There, where I know my violent love lays

Down in a row of silent, dove-graydays

Here, in a row of silent, dove-gray days

Wherever I go, I am snowboundBy thoughts of him whom I would shun

I loved them all, one by oneCannot gain ground, cannot outrun

But time marches alongYou can’t always stick around

But, when the final count is doneI will be in my hometownI will be in my hometown

Ribbon Bows(6:11)

There is a spring, not far from hereThe water runs both sweet and clear

Both sweet and clear, and coldCould crack your

bones with veins of gold

I stood, a-wagging, at the tapJust a-waiting on the lagging, rising sap

I held the cold tin ladle to my lipAt the Shrine of the Thousand Arms

I lowered my eyes to sip

What a beautiful day to catch my driftOr be caught up in it

You want your love, LoveCome and get your love

I only took it backBecause I thought you didn’t

How my ears did ringAt the municipal poundFrom that old hangdogTo which I was bound

Curled ‘round the bottom rungDoesn’t anybody want you

Well, come on, darlingI could use someone like you around

I am not like you, I ain’t from this placeAnd I do reserve the right

To repeat all my same mistakes

i

- 53 -

And, in the night, like youI certainly bite and chew

What I can find and never seem to lose the taste

What a horrible faceI feel me make For Pete’s sake

What you have told me, I cannot eraseThough I keep on saying

And I do believe, it is not too late

All day, you’re hassling me with triflesBlack nose of the dog, as cold as a rifle

Indicating, with a nudgeGod, no God. God, no God

Sweet, appraising eye of the dogBlink once if God, twice if no god

My mama may be ashamed of meWith all of my finery

Carrying onWhooping it up till the early morn

Lost and lornAmong the madding revelry

Sure, I can passHoney, I can pass

Particularly when I start to tip my glassI’ll be a sport and have

a go at that old songSinging unabashed, about

“Them city girls,With their ribbon bows, and their fancy sash”

But, though I get so sadCould swear the night makes

a motion to claim meAround that second verse

I reckon I’ve felt worse and still held fast

But, later on, when I am aloneAlone at last

Well I take my god to taskI take my doggone god to task

Kingfisher(9:11)

Whose is the hand that I will holdWhose is the face I will see

Whose is the name that I will callWhen I am called to meet thee

In this life, who did you loveBeneath the drifting ashes

Beneath the sheeting banks of airThat barrenly bore our rations

When I could speak, it was too lateDidn’t you hear me calling

Didn’t you see my heart leapLike a pup in the constant barley

In this life, where did you crouchWhen the sky had set to boiling

Burning within, seen from withoutAnd your gut was a serpent, coiling

And, for the sake of that pit of snakesFor whom did you allay your shyness

And spend all your mercy and madness, and grace

In a day, beneath the bending cypress

It was not on principalShow, Pro-heart, that you have got gall

A miracle, I can bear a lot, but not that pall

I can bear a lot, but not that pall!Kingfisher, sound the alarm

Say, “Sweet little darling, now,Come to my arms;

Tell me all about the loveYou left on the farm”

He was a kind, unhurried manWith a heavy lip and a steady handBut he loved me just like a little child

Like a little child loves a little lambThrown to the ground by

something down thereBitten by the bad air, while the clouds tick

Trying to read all the signsPreparing for when the bombs hit

i

- 54 -

Hung from the underbelly of the earthWhile the stars skid away, below

Gormless and brakeless, gravel-looseFalling silent as gavels in the snow

I lay back and spit my chawWrapped in the long arm of the Law

Who has seen it allI can bear a lot, but not that pall

I can bear a lot, but not that pallKingfisher, cast your fly

Oh, Lord, it happens without even trying

When I sling a low look from my shuttering eye

Blows rain upon the one you lovedAnd, though you were only sparring

There’s blood on the eye, unlace the glove

Say, honey I am not sorry

Stand here and name the one you loved

Beneath the drifting ashesAnd, in naming, rise above time

As it, flashing, passesWe came by the boatload

And were immobilizedWorshipping volcanoesCharting the loping skies

The tides of the earthLeft us bound, and calcified

And made as obstinate as obsidianUnmoving, save our eyes

Just mooning and blinkingFrom faces marked with coal

Ash cooling and shrinkingCracks loud as thunder rolling

I swear I know you, you know meWhere have we met before

Tell me trueTo whose authority

Do you consign your soul

I had a dream you came to meSaid you shall not

do me harm anymore

And with your knife, you evicted my life

From its little lighthouse on the seashore

And I saw that my blood had no bounds

Spreading in a circle like an atom bomb

Soaking and felling everything in its path

And welling in my heart like a birdbath

It is too short, the day we are bornWe commence with our dying

Trying to serve with the heart of a childKingfisher, lie with the lion

Does Not Suffice(6:45)

I will pack up my pretty dressesI will box up my high-heeled shoesA sparkling ring, for every finger

I’ll put away, and hide from view

Coats of boucle, jacquard and cashmere

Cartouche and tweed, all silver shotAnd everything that could remind you

Of how easy I was not

I’ll tuck away my gilded buttonsI’ll bind my silks in shapeless bales

I’ll wrap it all on up, in reams of tissueAnd then I’ll kiss you, sweet farewell

You saw me rise to our occasionAnd so deny the evidence

You caused me to burn, and twistAnd grimace against you

Like something caughtOn a barbed-wire fence

Now, you can see me fallBack here redoubled

Full bewildered and amazedI have gotten into some terrible troubleBeneath your blank and rinsing gaze

i

- 55 -

It does not sufficeFor you to say I am a sweet girl

Or to say you hate to see me sadBecause of you

It does not sufficeTo merely lie beside each other

As those who love each other do

I picture you, rising up in the morningStretching out on your boundless bed

Beating a clear path to the showerScouring yourself red

The tap of hangersSwaying in the closet

Unburdened hooksAnd empty drawers

And everywhere I tried to love youIs yours again

And only yours

Joanna Newsom