Garden in Flames

by Tam Lin

Garden in Flames cover art
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1.
05:25
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2.
05:02
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3.
05:06
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4.
04:47
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5.
04:06
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6.
05:01
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7.
04:52
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8.
04:57
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9.
09:32
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about

This recording is intended to be freely copied, distributed, and shared among individuals only. Under no circumstances may it be used for commercial purposes without the express consent of the artist.

credits

released 19 October 2011
Paul Weinfield: Vocals, Guitars, Synths, Songwriting
Ryan Mackstaller: Electric Guitar, Lap Steel Guitar
Adam Platt: Piano, Electric Piano
Ward Williams: Cello
Benjamin Wright: Bass
Keith Robinson: Drums
Mike Shobe: Trumpet (tracks 3 & 9)
Julianna Takacs: Harmonium (tracks 2 & 6)
Bisan Toron: Vocals (tracks 2 & 6)
Atash Yaghmaian: Recitation (track 9)

Produced, recorded, and mixed by Mario J. McNulty

Mastered by Dave McNair

Recorded in New York City at Alice’s Restaurant, China Bunker Studios, Tainted Blue Studios, Robinson's Basement, and Incognito

Photography and design by Elizabeth Bick

All songs copyright of Paul Weinfield/Tam Lin Music Publishing (BMI, 2011)

www.tamlinmusic.com


With immense gratitude to: Atash Yaghmaian, Henry Weinfield, Joyce Block, Saralena Weinfield, Vera Weinfield, Christine Berl, Tommaso Rizzotti, Arash Yaghmaian, Behzad Yaghmaian, Panteha Moghimi, Elizabeth Bick, Peter Doobinin, Tony Conniff, Steven Daly, Kusandha
Hertrich, C. Whitrock, David, Jaclyn, and Simon Kennedy, Shadneh, Alex Goodman, Andrew Drazic, Johnny Drazic, Dave Estes, Alfred Vanderbilt, Veronica Varlow, Paul Kahn, April Barton, Ryan Stepka, Esther Rothschild, Arun Sundararajan, Eve Allen, Misha Jenkins, Ankeen McGuire, and so many others.

tags

tags: adam platt benjamin wright contains multitudes keith robinson paul weinfield ryan mackstaller tam lin ward williams New York

license

all rights reserved

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about

Tam Lin is an ever-expanding musical project out of New York City, based around the songs of singer/songwriter/bandleader ... more Paul Weinfield. Tam Lin's new album, Garden In Flames, is out now! It's completely free to own and is designed to benefit the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. less

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Track Name: Field of Reeds
Field of Reeds

On the Judgment Day they took me down
to my grandma's house at the break of dawn.
It had been so long.
The chairs were cracked and the curtains were torn
and nothing remained of the laughter I’d grown up on.
All of it gone.

And they said, “Look around, for this is all to show
that love is not a returning.
Love is learning to let go.”

I saw where it leads, the river of my trembling heart!
Down to a field of reeds,
back to the place where the ending meets the start.
Start, start, start.

Then they led me upstairs down a hallway
and I heard a woman laugh
taking a bath.
I pushed open the door, I saw her there in the tub.
Her head underwater, she didn’t make a sound.
Already drowned.

And they said, “Can you love her, now that you've been shown
that love is not a yearning?
Love is learning to let go."

I saw where it leads, the river of my trembling heart!
Down to a field of reeds,
back to the place where the ending meets the start.
In the beautiful sun,
the bodies shrivel and souls take their release.
A field of reeds
in the morning of an everlasting peace.
Peace, peace, peace.

And when I tell you about my visions
I notice you don’t look me in the eye.
And I know why.
You run your fingers along my back
but you feel the crack in loving what has to die.
But don’t you cry.

For they told me to tell you what you already know:
That your love is forever burning
in the stillness of your learning to let go.

Look where it leads, the river of your trembling heart!
Down to a field of reeds,
back to the place where we never have to part.
In the beautiful sun,
our bodies shrivel and souls take their release.
A field of reeds in the morning of an everlasting,
everlasting, everlasting peace.

Tam Lin
Track Name: Waiting to Touch the Ground
Waiting to Touch the Ground

Sometimes I feel happy,
but I wonder what that’s worth.
In my little balloon I drift on
without a place on earth.

I’m waiting, waiting, waiting
for my feet to touch the ground.
Waiting, waiting, waiting

for my feet to touch the ground

Please don’t leave me, baby.
Don’t look at me with regret.
I’ve got a beautiful life to give you,

I just haven’t found it yet.

I’m waiting, waiting, waiting

for my feet to touch the ground.
Waiting, waiting, waiting

for my feet to touch the ground.

I see the children playing and I think,
"What a strange thing to be born!"
They seem so much older than I am.
They seem to know what this living is for.

I love so many people.
Good friends, I’ve got so much to repay.
So load me with your burdens.
Don’t let me float away.

I’m waiting, waiting, waiting

for my feet to touch the ground.
Waiting, waiting, waiting

for my feet to touch the ground
Waiting till I touch the ground (etc.)

Tam Lin
Track Name: Fever Birds
Fever Birds

Oh Lord I am sick and I will not be well.
I’m spitting blood and coughing up bread.
And my father’s men wait at the gates of my cell.
There’s black water seeping through the sheets of my bed
and the fever birds are coming to swarm round my head.

Oh Lord I was born in the mouth of a mountain
and I lived with my mother in a house made of tin.
But my father came in the cover of moonlight.
He brought me to his mansion and he locked me in.
Now the fever birds are coming to scratch at my skin.

Oh Lord how I wept to be kept from my mother!
My body grew wasted, my lungs filled with tears.
But I learned how to fly on the wings of my sickness,
back to my mother and back through the years
with the fever birds coming to shriek in my ears.

One morning I woke and looked up above me.
I saw a girl with the brightness of a hundred Julys.
She wiped off my head and she said she would love me.
And I felt a white light come creeping up through my thighs.
I felt the fever birds coming to claw out my eyes.

We lay there together in the blindness of passion.
But in the morning I turned and saw what she’d done.
There were sores on my body where her lips had kissed me.
And I started to scream but no scream would come
for the fever birds had torn out my tongue.

Oh Lord I am sick and I will not be well!
So listen you lovers who seek solace from pain.
Watch how you fly on the wings of your sickness!
Your dreams of beauty will just drive you insane
and the fever birds are coming to roost in your brain.

Tam Lin
Track Name: Garden in Flames
Garden in Flames

My love is a garden in flames.
It blooms as it burns away.
It dies and still it remains
for you, my baby.

I held a picture of the morning we met,
my hands aching with an old desire.
It hurt so much to see your picture's hold on me.
I set that photograph on fire.

My love is a garden in flames.
It blooms as it burns away.
It dies and still it remains

for you, my baby.

I went down to the house you live in now

but nothing but an empty lot remained.
I saw your husband too, and I asked him about you.
He said, "I've never known anyone by that name."

My love is a garden in flames.
It blooms as it burns away.

It dies and still it remains

for you, my baby.

And I see time is like confetti scattered in the sky.
Limitless worlds are drifting side by side.
And the lives that might have been
live on in each of them
but I couldn’t gather them if I tried.

So come to my garden in flames,

oh you, who never really went away.
In the flowering blaze, I'll give all my days

to you, my baby

to you, my baby

to you, my baby

Tam Lin
Track Name: Lionheart
Lionheart

All things must break.
All things are outgrowing

the shapes that they take.

Life just keeps going.
And our bond may break,
against all of my hoping.
But my heart won’t break.
It will only break open.

All things must lose.
The war ain’t behind us.
The mistakes we ignored

are going to hunt down and find us.
But if it’s you I must lose,

let me lose you with kindness
because my heart won’t lose.
It will just lose its blindness.

So roar, lion of my heart,
till you know why love is real.
Roar, till you know why you have to feel

every bit of this deep inside.

All things must stop

and lay down their burdens.

The clenched fist must drop,

the eye close its curtains.
And our love may stop,

but of this I am certain:

My heart won’t stop.
It will only stop hurting.

So roar, lion of my heart,

till you know why love is real.
R
oar, till you know why you have to feel

every bit of this deep inside.

Tam Lin
Track Name: Song of the Maharaja
Song of the Maharaja

I see my friends assemble
around my ivory throne
and a thousand voices tremble
at my every dying moan.
But none can feel what I feel
as my life is withdrawn.
I’m going to miss this world, miss this world,
miss this when I'm gone.
I’m going to miss this world, miss this world,
miss this when I'm gone.

My time has been victorious.
I’ve plundered pearls and musk
and a thousand jasmine bodies
disrobing in the dusk.
But all my naked happiness
has put its clothes back on.
I’m going to miss this world, miss this world,
miss this when I'm gone.
I’m going to miss this world, miss this world,
miss this when I'm gone.

And I hear a hissing in the garden
and the lonesome jackal's screams.
And I feel my body start to harden
as the night folds into dreams.
As one lamp lights another
in the hours before the dawn,
I can feel my soul reach for new flesh,
dying to be reborn
dying to be reborn
dying to be reborn

In the dimming of my senses
I behold great, future things:
A world where buildings kiss the sky
and men fly with metal wings.
And maybe I'll be a young man there
but I'll singing the same song:
I’m going to miss this world, miss this world,
miss this when I'm gone.
I’m going to miss this world, miss this world,
miss this when I'm gone.

Tam Lin
Track Name: Solomon's Baby
Solomon's Baby

The days keep on splitting
and the hours are filled with strife.
I see you crying in the kitchen,
cutting up onions with a knife.
And the rings fall from the table,
but I don’t know which one makes you a wife.
You’ve become so many people,

and it’s so hard to hold them all in one life.

But I’m still so in love, honey, so in love.
I’d do anything to keep you from pain.
Oh I’m still so in love, honey, so in love.
I’d give you up, never doubting I’d get your love again.

The nights keep on splitting.
You share some with me and some with him.
I just try to feel things deeply.

I don’t complain or ever ask you where you’ve been.
But if a bucket has no bottom,

what’s the use in trying to fill it to the brim?

You’ve become so many people,

and it’s so hard to hold on to all of them.

But I’m still so in love, honey, so in love.
I’d do anything to keep you from pain.
Oh I’m still so in love, honey, so in love.
I’d give you up, never doubting I’d get your love again.

I’ve read King Solomon loved a woman.

He loved her more than his own throne.
H
alf of her wanted to stay with him;

the other half wanted to roam.
But he would not cut his love in half,

so he let his woman wander on alone.

He had a heart that stayed whole,

and there’s nothing greater any man can own.

Don’t you see I’m still in love, honey? so in love.
I’d do anything to keep you from pain.
Oh I’m so in love, honey, so in love.
I’d give you up, never doubting I’d get your love again.

Tam Lin
Track Name: Money
Money

I know I never loved you,
but I was on a losing streak.
I was looking for reassurance,
or maybe just looking to feel weak.
Your boot heel it was waiting
and I took what I could get
because I waited so long for happiness
and what'd I have to show for it?

Money, you ain't the one I'm waiting for.
But Money, who's gonna hold me
when I can't hold on any more?

I made music for you
but you were not impressed.
You don't care much for beauty
if it can't be possessed.
You'd think I'd be disenchanted
or have more dignity,
but your scorn made you that much more
beautiful to me.

Money, you ain't the one I'm waiting for.
But Money, who's gonna hold me
when I can't hold on any more?

I keep chasing at shadows.
I keep swinging at the air.
I keep looking for something deeper
when there's nothing deeper there.

Now I claim I am wiser
and my taste is more discreet.
But sometimes I look up and find
I'm right back on your street.
They say, "Seek where the warmth is,"
and often times I do.
But part of me still wants to know
I mean something to you.

Money, you ain't the one I'm waiting for.
But Money, who's gonna hold me,
who's gonna hold me,
who’s gonna hold me
when I can’t hold on anymore.

Tam Lin
Track Name: One Woman, Many Women, No Woman: Love
One Woman, Many Women, No Woman: Love

I.
I danced one dance on our wedding day.
It was over in a moment and I felt you pull away.
It was over in a moment but a moment was enough
for my life to be lit up in a flash of your love.

And I thought:
One woman, one feeling,
to follow wherever it goes,
to follow wherever it goes.
I'll follow wherever it goes.

Then a snake bit my ankle and I sat down on the grass.
It was over in a moment and I felt the pain pass.
But the flower girls were crying and the stars burst above.
And I saw my life fading in a flash of your love.

And I thought:
One woman, one feeling,
to follow wherever it goes,
to follow wherever it goes.
I'll follow wherever it goes.

And I went down, down,
underground, underground.
I went down …

II.
I lifted my head
in the land of the dead.
I felt in the darkness where the bodies meshed.
There were hands on my eyes.
There are hands on my thighs
and for a moment, a moment, I was nothing but flesh.

And my soul went swimming in a sea of women.
There was a sea of women running through my heart.
My soul went swimming in a sea of women.
There was a sea of women running through my heart.

What was I looking for?
What was I looking for?
I was trying to remember before it shut me down.
Was it her? Was it her? 
No, it was all a blur!
And I prayed my love would never let me drown.

And my soul went swimming in a sea of women.
There was a sea of women running through my heart.
My soul went swimming in a sea of women.
There was a sea of women running through my heart.

You better quit your sinning!
You better quit your sinning!
Can't you see those women are going to break you down.
No, no, no, all will be well,
although I drift through hell
because if I love, my love will never let me drown.
If I love, my love will never let me drown.
If I love, my love will never let me drown.
Let me drown.
Let me drown.

III.
"Wake up, Mr. Silverbeard,
can't you see you're getting old?"
"Yes, I see the window's frosted
and the winter air is cold."
"What will you do for company
when your maid goes for the day?"
"I'll climb up that old mountainside,
and there, this song I'll play:

"I've got no woman, I've got no wife,
but I've got my heart and I've got my life
and I don't give a damn about the worry and strife
that comes from wanting more.
I don't want no more."

"Tell me, Mr. Silverbeard,
did you let her slip away?"
"All things slip away, my dear, 
you'll discover that some day."
"Tell me, Mr. Silverbeard,
 is there nothing that you regret?"
"I don't regret the past, my dear,
because I don't understand it yet.

"I've got no woman, I've got no wife,
but I've got my heart and I've got my life
and I don't give a damn about the worry and strife
that comes from wanting more.
I don't want no more."

"So what can I do, Mr. Silverbeard,
in the hour before I go?"
"Just sit right there. You look so much

like a girl I used to know ..."


IV.
I woke up
and it was still there.
Our love was still there.
Our love is everywhere.

I saw the empty room
in the cold morning glare.
Our love is still there.
Our love is everywhere.

You didn't come home,
no, you didn't come home,
but honey, I don't care.
Our love is still there.
Love is everywhere.

I just wanted to tell you that
last night, I dreamed three dreams,
and I woke up aware
that love is still there,
that love is everywhere.

First, I dreamed I was a young man,
a lover, and I died in despair.
But love was still there.
Love is everywhere.

Then I dreamed I was a dead man,
a lost soul, drifting lonely and scared.
But love was still there.
Love is everywhere.

Then I dreamed I was an old man,
all alone. I had a life no one would share.
But love was still there.
Love is everywhere.

Do you hear what I'm singing?
I know you hear what I'm singing,
though I'm singing it to the air.
Our love is still there.
Love is everywhere.

One woman, many women, no woman,
oh Lord, it's the same heart, I swear.
Love is still there.
Love is everywhere.

One woman, many women, no woman,
oh Lord, it's the same pain to bear.
But love is still there.
Love is everywhere.

Love is still there.
Love is everywhere.
Love is still there.
Love is everywhere.

Tam Lin