One Can Only Hope

Time ago in Massachusetts
Saw you in a dying birch tree
Swinging from the branches like a noose
Hid our love inside the woodpile
Slow-danced in the sunken garden
Parted ways and I ain't seen you since
Amtrak train bound for Penn station
Leaking from my eyes and ink pen
Praying Casey Jones will take me home
I'm wondering if you've met regret
Or if she's tried to kiss you yet
Or maybe make you second-guess your own flesh and bone
One can only hope
Tennessee in mid-November
Sour milk, asbestos shingles
Ready me for winter's loneliness
I'm looking hard now for a sign
A hymnal with a broken spine
Entrails perfectly aligned, you never really know
One can only hope
Hidden in an Austin motel
Hunched over a plywood table
Writing words I'm never gonna send
But maybe if I start to sing
They'll float along what might have been
As buoyant as original sin and find their way to you
One can only hope
One can only hope