Breathe

Some say the glass is 9/10 empty.
Others say smile, it's 1/10 full.
I say it's not a glass at all,
But a tank that is riddled with holes,
And is draining.
With a tiny, stubborn fish inside
That is straining.

And she believes in the infinite chance
Of every meticulously executed rain dance.

But as the last drops drain, she
Holds her head high, and I swear
One day,
She'll learn to breathe the air.
Breathe.

Dream Song

She's giving her heart
To the last leg.
Though she's scrambled what's left
Of the nest egg.

The journey still calls her
Digs nickel to dollar.
Now she's hanging her life
On two days, two numbers.

Bags bursting with failure.
Her peaceful expression is fake.
She says she's strong, but let's face it
She can't budge a two-week wait.

And she picks up the phone
At the end of the day.
He says, "Sorry, but your plans have gone South."
She's been tracking the North Star
In darkness and haze.
Now she's lost,
And it's time to come home.

An end is an ending
Whenever Time stamps it.
Beginning can be harder to face.
But she leaves all her bags
And she follows the dream song.
It sings of a brighter place.

She is free and not running,
And all the notes come through without a thought.
She is more than this one thing,
She is so much more than she's not.

Ashes to Clay

In the season of rain, nineteen ninety-one,
Erupted a cloud that swallowed the sun.
The sight of the future, the link to the past
Buried alive in ash avalanche.

Now I come to your ashes, knee deep in my dust
And your phoenix somehow breaks through....

Ashes to clay,
Gonna mold a new vision.
That life's gone away.
Form a fresh definition.

Ashes to clay,
Lift the floor to the ceiling.
Start living today.
Join the scars with the healing.

The God that you cried to, the coldness of June
Followed eruption with flood of typhoon,
Yet you smile as I hold your work in my hands.
The family you dug, your art from the ash

Now I kneel at your alter and whisper a prayer
Let your spirit somehow shine through...

Ashes, swirling around
Can I dig life up from the ground?
Can I borrow
Strength when there’s none to be found?

My Frozen Future

Locked away, you wait suspended.
My treasure, can you feel my care?
If I make a space, will you come and fill it?
Close the gap from here to there.

Cells in motion, interrupted.
Where do you begin to be?
Please tell me that you plan on crossing
The line from dream to reality.

And this song's for you my love, my frozen future.
Two pieces pushed together, perfect and still.
And every day I wonder, will we meet some day?
Will the thaw bring flowers to my windowsill?

Days go by, the sun slips past,
And leaves you trapped in icy dew.
Remember that I strive to capture
The sunrise that's meant just for you.

I'm hoping that the lullaby
Will reach your icy place.
And in this world or another
We'll recognize each other's face.

Julie Aguas

Our Girl

Some say your soul must have been
Too good to stay.
But I'd take you horrid and here
Over perfect and gone away.
 
Some say that we get our strength
From what life puts us through.
But I'd rather be a weakling and
Be holding hands with you.
With you.

And some just say nothing cuz what could there be to say?
Can't think of one thing that could make this be ok.

But this day is taking me back, taking me back.
The memories keep flooding.
And I'm shedding the black, shedding the black.
Gotta make it mean something.

So I'm filling balloons, red, yellow, and green,
And they'll fly, fly for a girl whose face we've never seen.
And out from the night sky, the colors will swirl.
And we'll feel for a time the brightness of our girl.

Some days I wake, I was dreaming.
You had my brown hair,
And chocolate almond eyes,
A perfect equal share.

Some days I wake, I forget
And then something brings it fresher.
Sorry and goodbye on every
Track of my broken record.
My record.

I have all my days to wonder how it could have been
If your days and my days could have stretched just enough to let you in.

Flinging, kicking,
So they feel you too.
Ever remember,
A fleeting joy’s still true.
Softly falling,
And lifting up again.
Better together,
Beginning from the end.

You Are There

3 am wakeup call,
On the other end
A cheerful hello
My thoughts are on a hamster wheel,
Begging for anywhere
Else to go

You catch them and quiet the din
A spell of sedation sinks in
A ray of light breaks through
Where only the dark clouds have been.

And every day up to this moment
You are there, you are there.
Your love is so constant you might think
That I'm not aware, not aware
Of how lost I would be
If you were more than a phone call away from me.

3 years old, my skinned knee
Was not a match for your
Magic kiss
But there is no force on earth
With power enough to put a
Dent in this

And you don't try to sell me the line
That everything's going to be fine.
But I can go on just knowing
You hold the net under my tight rope line.

And I'm sorry
To be constantly dragging you down with me.
If good were rewarded,
Then you’d be 100% problem free.
I know it's not enough,
And I'm sorry it's taken so long.
But I find you too extraordinary
To be summed up in a song..

Living in a Doorway

Some people never knock on the door.
Some politely ring the bell.
Some are warmly ushered in,
Some thrown through against their will.

But some of us are boarded out,
And pound til our knuckles bleed.
The door will budge,
But not enough.
And we are stuck

<chorus> ---------
Living in a doorway
Neither in nor out
No black and white, just more gray
A stalemate of hope and doubt.

Let us paint the door-frame yellow,
And sweep the entry tile.
Let's settle in together-
We may be here for a while.
--------------------

We feel the constant breeze as others
Pass effortlessly by.
No readiness, no worthiness,
No rhyme or reason why.

Curse at the heavens,
Curse at each other,
Curse at the uncursed passerby.
Can't move forward,
Can't move back.
Might as well stretch the middle, ground to sky.
 

Round Blade

I’m walking and whistling.
A new day takes form.
Deeply I'm breathing
The sweet air left after the storm.
I like where I am now.
No longer counting
On scraping and scarring
From scaling the treadmill mountain.

But don't look now,
Cuz in she saunters
Guess what she's carrying...

Round Blade,
Gets me every time.
Just when the coast has been cleared,
Sneaks up from behind.
Bright glow,
Casts the shadow on me.
Just when I think that I'm standing,
I'm a foot amputee.

Got nothing against her,
I know she can't help it,
But man that knife of hers
Drains the life out of me.

I’m turning away,
She's on my TV screen.
She's gracing the cover
Of another magazine.
So sure of herself,
Believes without question,
That her dumb luck is because
Of divine intervention.

Call on a friend,
Cry on her shoulder.
Good God!  What's she carrying?

Some Mistake

There must be some, some mistake.
There can't be a plan
That could have been written this way.

Yesterday, life stretched out
In colorful pictures of stepstones and milestones
Instead, a stone bears your name.

And how can the birds sing
Like any other day?
And how can my heart beat
Though you’ve gone away?
And why do arms that are empty
Buckle under the weight?
There must be some mistake.

There must be some, some way through this haze.
I'm reaching and grasping but can't find my way back
To yesterday space.

Walls for trains are tinted dark gray.
The rocker is idling next to the clothing
With nothing to do but hang.

Integration

One day the stranger
Knocked on my window.
I closed the latch but
She still crept through.

She wore a black dress,
A cold expression.
Tinted from brightness,
Beaten to blue.

This integration
Has got me weary.
A concrete anchor
Thrown down the well.

She weeps in silence.
I'm learning slowly
To sit close by and
Play parallel.

She holds a mirror.
I can't see clearly.
The face reflected
Is hers or mine.

With each step forward,
I'm seeing double.
A peaceful struggle,
Smoothed out by time.

Knocking on Wood

Saw you today
So far so OK.
No reason to doubt
It will all work out.

So often thinking
I've turned to the happy ending,
When the next page
Is waiting,
Erasing.

But my knuckles are numb
From knocking on wood.
Why can't this news be allowed to stand proud
And call itself...good.

I've had enough
Of knocking on wood.
I want to celebrate today without visions of tomorrow
Ripping it all away.

Saw you today
Gave you a name.
Won't say it out loud
But if I did it would sound

Like a beautiful dreamer
I'm dreaming of holding.
But will you be there
When I'm
Waking?

Ten times bitten, 1000 times shy
Bracing for pianos
To fall from the sky.

We're ok today,
And that's the best that anyone can ever say.

My Angel

The Plan is out the window
The Book is out of sight
Stale prayers echo through tunnels
With no hint of light.

And each verse that I clung to
Is pinned on its end by a question mark.
And I'm asking myself is there lingering light in the fading spark?
But I look up to find
I'm next to an angel.

Priests and Levites averted their eyes.
You propped my head to gaze at the sky.
I braced for deja vu's boomerang.
You paved a path leading out of pain.

And when every star mocks me for
Thousands of wishes that no one grants.
And I'm asking myself does everything boil down to random chance?
Still I can't deny
You must be an angel.

And angels bring
Possibility
Is there some something
More than we see?

Have eyes too high
Been blinding me
To a light binding
Humanity?

You gave body and soul
And asked for nothing back
You painted smiling trains
On a wall that was filled with black.

So when demons come knocking
I look in his eyes where future meets past.
And I'm asking myself can there be any fortress that's built to last?
But this house stands today
Thanks to an angel
Thanks to you, my angel.

You’ve given it all.
Stepping up for a free-fall.
Still pulling us through.
Hitch a ride on your faith for two.

Train Girls

I grew up to the tune,
“I Believe I Can Fly”.
Sang it from the heart,
With a tear in my eye.
But 12 years hurling off the rooftops,
Landing heart first splattering,
I’m finally understanding,

I’m a Train Girl,
Not a wing to my name.
Taking the long cut,
And getting there just the same.

It may always hurt
To take a glance at the birds,
But I won’t let them break me down.
We Train Girls can navigate the shaky ground.

All aboard, hop on
No blood is required.
Join our motley gang
On our runaway ride.
We’ll crawl up mountains with no promise of a peak,
And free-fall down,
To the cradle of the deep.

We’re Train Girls,
Not a wing to our name.
Taking the long cut,
And getting there just the same.

It may always hurt
To take a glance at the birds,
But our bones are built to bear a load.
We Train Girls lean into the bends in the road.

The tears diving free from my eyes,
The only part of me that ever flies.
As angels fall from the sky,
A little part of me still wants to try.
I’m banishing equal and heaven-sent,
And getting on embracing equivalent.

Popping our umbrellas as the birds soar overhead
We’re popping our umbrellas as the birds soar overhead
We’re popping our umbrellas as the birds soar.
We’re Train Girls, yeah.

My New Time

You said hey
Look at me,
Watch the show.
But no... I'm bouncing memory to plan.

Things will be
Better when
Better if
My will...could force the hourglass sand.

Don't know which
Way to push
Down or up
Enough...it's slipping through my hands.

So much time
Filling time
Killing time
Willing time...to pass.

Come to find
Time has inched
Windows down
Leaving just...a crack.

Weak to tough
Smooth to rough
Brown to gray
Today...sits still and wasted.

Got to drink
From the cup
In my hand
It can't...be bitter or sweet untasted.

Space compressing, caving in,
Shoulders pinned by weight at both ends.
Got to fight off future and past,
Time for Time's role to be recast

No more counting the minutes till we get there
No more tallying the days that are gone
My new time is lost in the rhythm of the song.

No more tracking of the endless cycle
Not more measuring the length of the line.
My new time listens to the beat of your heart next to mine.​