"Slouching Towards Branson" lyrics
Now, the story that I have told you guys tonight is about as true as a true story can be while still being a story, you know, uh, life isn't a story and I am not a story
Timing, details, and order of events are beside the point. You know, whether Branson Missouri or Pigeon Forge Tennessee has the worse bible show is beside the point
The point is that in Casey Illinois, I played in front of an audience for the first time in about two years while Christina sat in the grass and let strangers who found me on the Internet take turns petting Casper, who no longer bites at her foot
The point is that I have been paralysed by the conviction that writing was an irrelevant act, that the world as I understood it no longer existed and if I were ever to be able to work again, it would be necessary to come to terms with disorder, and I'd been trying to do that, trying, not always succeeding, far from it
But trying to silence the gibbering and begging of the animal heart inside me that is forever pleading for literally anything to cling to as reality seems to spiral further and further out past the point of coherence or cohesion
trying to relax the innovative opposable-thumbed fist inside my brain that is forever strangling the center
Trying to make it hold and trying to conquer the need for victory, and to pick the flimsiest piece of woodland flotsam from the creek bed and toss it like a hat into the ring onto the oily, rainbow, foamy, polluted, fucking current and still root for my little green makeshift toy boat to win
But sometimes I can't help but think that if we're lucky we're gonna live long enough to see more dark ages
Sometimes I can't help but believe that the only thing that I believe is that things fall apart, the only thing that I believe is that the center will not hold, the only thing that I believe is that doom is the human condition, the only thing that I find myself able to believe is that "20 centuries of stoney sleep were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle and now, what rough beast, its hour come 'round at last, slouches toward Branson fucking Missouri to be born."
How do we do it, you know? Hold on to the faith that is unfortunately the only thing keeping us tethered each day? You know, hang on to that (let's face it) baseless core assumption that everything is going to be "okay if we just hold on a little longer," despite knowing full well about the grimness of the horizons ahead
And I don't know and I don't have any answers. The only thing that I can say, and this is what I learned over the past couple years and what has me here tonight. Is that you can't expect yourself to be properly dressed for the end of the world, just, uh, put some pants on
And as long as you have someone who doesn't mind how you look without them, any old pair will do
Timing, details, and order of events are beside the point. You know, whether Branson Missouri or Pigeon Forge Tennessee has the worse bible show is beside the point
The point is that in Casey Illinois, I played in front of an audience for the first time in about two years while Christina sat in the grass and let strangers who found me on the Internet take turns petting Casper, who no longer bites at her foot
The point is that I have been paralysed by the conviction that writing was an irrelevant act, that the world as I understood it no longer existed and if I were ever to be able to work again, it would be necessary to come to terms with disorder, and I'd been trying to do that, trying, not always succeeding, far from it
But trying to silence the gibbering and begging of the animal heart inside me that is forever pleading for literally anything to cling to as reality seems to spiral further and further out past the point of coherence or cohesion
trying to relax the innovative opposable-thumbed fist inside my brain that is forever strangling the center
Trying to make it hold and trying to conquer the need for victory, and to pick the flimsiest piece of woodland flotsam from the creek bed and toss it like a hat into the ring onto the oily, rainbow, foamy, polluted, fucking current and still root for my little green makeshift toy boat to win
But sometimes I can't help but think that if we're lucky we're gonna live long enough to see more dark ages
Sometimes I can't help but believe that the only thing that I believe is that things fall apart, the only thing that I believe is that the center will not hold, the only thing that I believe is that doom is the human condition, the only thing that I find myself able to believe is that "20 centuries of stoney sleep were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle and now, what rough beast, its hour come 'round at last, slouches toward Branson fucking Missouri to be born."
How do we do it, you know? Hold on to the faith that is unfortunately the only thing keeping us tethered each day? You know, hang on to that (let's face it) baseless core assumption that everything is going to be "okay if we just hold on a little longer," despite knowing full well about the grimness of the horizons ahead
And I don't know and I don't have any answers. The only thing that I can say, and this is what I learned over the past couple years and what has me here tonight. Is that you can't expect yourself to be properly dressed for the end of the world, just, uh, put some pants on
And as long as you have someone who doesn't mind how you look without them, any old pair will do
