Ones and zeros scaffold our thoughts As the cyber-circus stirs our pots Shave and shear us we'll wear the guise As glam-spun heroes fondle our eyes Trough fill news feed such scrumptious slop Swaths 'tween skewed needs to toil and shop Maschinen-mensch in my looking glass My best friends are all holographs Wind us up the movement seems all ours But we wind up birds in clocks that sing the hour How are we to jump the rails tip the scales? And wail so long We're automaton gone so long automaton gone Texts calls, emails ray gun and stun me Laugh tracks, hearsay decide what's funny Alexa, Siri sweet talk us, dolls While Palantiri glow in our palms Wind us up we think we're cock of the walk But we wind up just spinning atop a music box Knock knock Anyone there? I just came to declare So long I'm Automaton gone So long I'm Automaton gone So long I'm Automaton gone Rack and pinion cogs are spinning My opinion backs into line Core processor cylinder pressure My will is lesser can't draw the line Valves are open pistons stroke and Dreams and hopes they trace the line Gears and levers these things I treasure All pre-measured to keep me in line Time after time I escape to find I'm back in still just their jack-in... the box and I pick the locks and I flee up the stairs there but it's like some picture by Escher As the camshaft's churning dial is turning All my yearnings fall into line Foot on treadle flesh is metal And I settle back into line Valves are open pistons stroke and Dreams and hopes trace the line Gears and levers these things I treasure All pre-measured to keep me in line And time after time... I think I'm so free and whimsical rare and so nimble But time after time... I find I'm a crank-up chimp doll just banging his cymbals And time after time... I keep trying undermining the confines winding round my mind and... Since I'm no longer inclined to get in front of or behind of the mule There really is just one escape hatch left that might get me through I'll just have to retool myself... into the Fool Clothes on backwards flipped wig on Thus closes the chapter automaton is gone

Saturday is everyday If you'll meet me in the garden on that bridge in the fog Our umbrellas will make an enclave We won't be coy we'll talk about it all Everyday is Saturday If you'll greet me 'neath the warm moon on that dock by the lake Bare toes will make ripples And we'll forget those cold, cold days And the rains we thought were against us Were just hinting we were in the wrong parade And the winds we felt bent against us Were just nudging us to this place... Where the dreams we were saving for tomorrow All came round today and it looks like they plan to stay Into one day melts all days If you'll join me on that path in the wood by the brook Stone skips and little bark ships And rapture nipping at all our hooks All days melt into one day When you point me t'ward the ladder up to your house in the tree With candles a halo Will put a ring 'round all we hope to reach And the time we thought had fenced us Was just defending us from infinity 'Cause the life we know that's lent to us Must be returned before we're ready And the dreams we're saving for tomorrow I think they'll all come round today looks like they're on their way And those rains we thought were against us Were just hinting we were in the wrong parade And the winds we felt bent against us Were just nudging us to this place... Where our last hopes are no longer borrowed From that Ferris wheel of joy and sorrow Where the dreams we were saving for tomorrow All came round today let's find them a place to stay

There's your silhouette out on the horizon Dark's comin', cold and wet What keeps you runnin'? You've committed no crime and... The earth and sky they've put a vice on you Sometimes I think you want them to Tell me, is it true? The grass in hell… has no dew You wake up in a culvert as dawn kicks wake the morn And you crawl from beneath the highway dusty and worn And the brambles clutch at you – it's all serpents and thorns And the oil derricks peck and grub for blood beneath the wastes And the gusts of disdain from passing cars and trucks erase Any taste of shift in the wind any trace of a new beginning Outlaw there was no crime Why you flyin' away? Barbed wire's sewn all along your route How long can it hold back the truth? Road lights become searchlights – as headlights hunt you down And the empty silence of the night feels like a sea and you're drownin' And the ghost towns are the only places where you've found common ground And the roadkill skeletons show you you're in the right place 'Cause this is what it comes to, no matter what the pace And the Fates spare none of their grace on you but it's not like you would ever ask them to And you say: “yeah, it's true the grass in Hell has no dew” Outlaw what say you? Will you shout “draw!” Then pull your gun against the sun Outlaw what can save you from... What you would become? It's not the last straw that breaks you Not the last god that you pray to Not the last cause that you deign to... Eye before shrugging it aside No, it's that you that you've decided The rhyme the reason the why of it No longer applies to you So ride on ride on Into the night drawn away from the light And the fight for unmolested sight has bore a hole right through the core of your precious war And still you ride on ride on Into the night drawn away from any life in which you might be... counted upon

I see... you way over there But between is ground unforgiving Any spot 'pon which I tread just leaves me sinking And the broken bits of my resolve can't be absolved into stepping stones It's not a lost cause just a lost causeway I'll find it again I know it's here somewhere Dwell here? No This place was never part of the plan But this sad patch of earth I could have done worse It was the only dry land left to make my stand Why did I come here? What had I hoped to gain? I knew of the rains that couldn't be tamed I staked a claim here just the same It's not a lost cause just a lost causeway I'll find it again I know it's here somewhere When I find it again I'll meet you there (interlude) Look around tiny islands There laid with sandbags 'gainst the tides Look at us all on our tiny islands Wearing faces, so brave trying to stand so tall And like lighthouses in the night with fraught eyes shining Hoping and dreading someone somehow will come to call Look at us... All... All... All... together... alone