Notes from Dave Carter's final songwriting class

"Dave Carter’s Final Class" -- Paul Zollo

Anyone who created such lines as...

"Well twenty years later he's headed south
the close-range victim of her sawed-off mouth"

"shootin fools and starry gazers, wizard hip and button-down
i walk the occam's razor way through priests and circus clowns
am i a visioner of faith or grace or vision or
another grinning prisoner in happytown

"as the sun is to the city
in the endless weeping winter
so is joy to me, and pity
when he leaves me, falsely tender"

"as a woman of heart and lenience
i make liberal with my pardons
i am generous with kindness
he, with smiles and exultations
though he binds his wounds in silence"

"This is an ordinary town and the prophet stands apart
This is an ordinary town and we brook no wayward heart
And every highway leads you prodigal back home
To the ordinary sidewalks you were born to roam"

...should have been immortal but, alas, he wasn't. Gladly, his music is.


"come, lonely hunter, chieftain and king, i will fly like the falcon when i go
bear me my brother under your wing, i will strike fell like lightnin when i go

i will bellow like the thunder drum, invoke the storm of war
a twistin pillar spun of dust and blood up from the prairie floor
i will sweep the foe before me like a gale out on the snow
and the wind will long recount the story, reverence and glory, when i go

spring, spirit dancer, nimble and thin, i will leap like coyote when i go
tireless entrancer, lend me your skin, i will run like the gray wolf when i go

i will climb the rise at daybreak, i will kiss the sky at noon
raise my yearnin voice at midnight to my mother in the moon
i will make the lay of long defeat and draw the chorus slow
i'll send this message down the wire and hope that someone wise is listenin when i go

and when the sun comes trumpets from his red house in the east
he will find a standin stone where long i chanted my release
he will send his mornin messenger to strike the hammer blow
and i will crumble down uncountable in showers of crimson rubies when i go

sigh, mournful sister, whisper and turn, i will rattle like dry leaves when i go
stand in the mist where my fire used to burn, i will camp on the night breeze when i go

and should you glimpse my wand'rin form out on the borderline
between death and resurrection and the council of the pines
do not worry for my comfort, do not sorrow for me so
all your diamond tears will rise up and adorn the sky beside me when i go"