Caleb Orion

I’ve been recording demos of a bunch of songs that I may want to record at some point, and I just wrote this one today and I wanted to show it off. It’s a love song, something I haven’t really written in a while, so I hope it’s good. I tried a few things differently than I normally do, and I want to change a few of the notes that I sing in some parts. Overall, this isn’t what it’s going to sound like, necessarily, but it’s a start and I can figure out where everything moves with it. I hope it’s good! Leave a note telling me what ya’ll think. Also, the MP3 can be downloaded here: http://www.caleborion.com/music/CalebOrion-HereOnTheIceFlow.mp3

I’m a torch and
She’s my cigarette
I will light her up
I’m her vision
She’s my wish and
Sip from the silver cup

We’ll both stay here
In the street, yeah
Flagging down the beat
In the midnight
Of the warm light
Underneath the sheet

Baby winds her body in the soft air
Will she bend or will she break or will she
Run her fingers through my hair
I’ve been losing my mind looking at her
When she’s there, it’s tough luck,
Trying not to stare

I will wait for you
No matter how long you want me to
Just as long as you
Tell me it’s what you want to do

We’re two thin wires
Seperated by
Air that we can’t see
Let the spark strike
And the fire ignite
So that it can be

I’m a lion
She’s a baroness
Let her tame me
From the rat race
And the cat chase
We’ll be freed

Baby turns her head to look and see
I have eyes for her and she has eyes for me
I’ve been looking on for this long now
How can I keep her, how can I let her know

I will wait for you
No matter how long you want me to
Just as long as you
Tell me it’s what you want to do

I’m alone and
She’s at home and
We’re apart
I will wake soon
In my own room
With her in my heart

It seems like everything makes me cry these days.
I’ll be sitting on the couch in our home, staring off into space, not watching the television but it’s on. I’ll hear a few words. Dead animals or cancer patients or womens rights or fires. I don’t even know how it sets me off anymore. But it all relates to you, somehow, all of this. Every teardrop is you.
Every clenched stomach, every day gone uneaten, every tiny granule of tooth scraped off in the anxious dark.
I haven’t cried this hard since you first left. Since you disappeared out of my life. I haven’t cried this hard since I was born. I’ve never cried this hard. Nobody has.
And when I’m not crying, or sleeping (when that happens), or working, or eating (when that happens), I’m stone and cold. I spend every open moment just sitting there. Just dying. I can feel my life seeping from me and out of my pores. I don’t need the air conditioner anymore. It’s all just cold already.

And I’m in one of those moods.
And I have my phone off.
And I sit on the couch with the television on.
When the door makes sound.

At first there’s no response in my mind. I sit slouched against the sofa, half pretending I don’t hear it, half not hearing it at all. I stand up.
Then I open the door and there’s a man with a black hat on, big wide black hat and he’s going to step inside, at least he looks like he’s going to. I don’t know what he’s doing there but I’ve been sitting on the couch in my half-awake coma for so long now that I don’t blink, and he just stands there, and neither of us speaks a word for what seems like an eternity.
Then he says, “Hi.”
What is he doing here?
“I’m looking for Elias?” He looks behind me into the house.
You left so long ago, and I don’t know where you are. But what is this man doing here? Looking for you?
“I need to see him about… business.”
What sort of business is the man in, what is Elias involved in? I try to remember what it was you did, and I can’t. Maybe I never knew. Maybe I did know, but I can’t recall because all I can think about is maybe you’re dead.
“If you see him give him this.”

I put the envelope the man gave me on the table and sit back down. I turn off the television, and in the dark while my eyes are still adjusting I think I see your ghost shimmering through the room to the kitchen. And I think you’re going to get a sandwich and I almost ask you to get me one, but I know that ghost isn’t real because my eyes finally adjust and the shadows that creep along the wall are as normal and natural as the envelope on the table.
And then I grab the envelope and I am about to tear it open but instead I swipe my hand across the surface of the table and knock everything off it. The glass of water I wasn’t drinking, the vase of dried flowers, the box of weed and the stack of magazines. The carpet quickly darkens in one big spot and I drop the envelope onto the empty table and turn to the bedroom.

For three nights afterwards I dream you’re in Chicago.

I had that dream again, like every time, the one where I’m sitting on the edge of my bed and my dad comes in and he’s holding the beer bottle in his hand and I can tell he’s high because he’s sort of looking through me and at me at the same time. And my dad sits down next to me and puts his arm around me and I feel weird about it all and I don’t know why, probably because he’s drunk, and maybe because he’s high, and maybe because I know what he’s here about and even though it’s a dream and I can’t read the clock and I could take control and leave I stay, because it’s not really a dream but a memory and I let myself relive it every night.
And my dad tells me he’s been in the kitchen a hundred times, pacing around looking through the cupboards and then he asks me how school’s going, and I shift my position and he stops talking for a while. Just sits there and looks down at the floor, forming the words already in his head.
And I remember that during all of this I was thinking about my best friend Kate, and then about boys, and those two thoughts always used to go hand-in-hand, but when I have the dream now I don’t think about boys, I think about you. You’re boys to me, and I sit next to my dad and I want to tell him how I met this wonderful boy and I want to tell him about you but that’s always around the point when my dad starts saying how he’s moving out and I’ll be living with him on the weekends but it’ll be in another city. He starts to cry so I sit there uncomfortable. I’ll cry later on the phone when I’m talking to Kate, perhaps when I realize what another city is, probably when I realize what that means to be with you, but for now I don’t know how to respond. Does that mean they’re getting a divorce?

Then the next day, or maybe in the dream I walk out of my room, there’s boxes all over the place and I remember that big mouth bass with the songs and it’s packed away, and suddenly I miss that bass even though I hated it back then.
My dad is loading his car in silence, putting each box in and his back hurts because he cringes every time he picks up a box and he cringes again when he puts it down. I can also tell because only a few boxes into loading his car he lights up a joint and starts to puff away at it, inhaling and pretending I’m not at the window peering out at him.

When he rolls from the curb and disappears down the street, I open the door to my room and walk downstairs. There’s an old cribbage board sitting on the table, the hands laying face up, and I can count the cards. Fifteen-two, Fifteen-four, and a pair for six.
This part never happened. I don’t know why it’s there. And it’s always there.
Then my mother walks in and the pegs begin to wind quickly along the board, leapfrogging around the bends like rubber-banded race cars. Moving by themselves — and the green overtakes the blue overtakes the brown, but falls back again as blue comes in with a good crib — cards flipping around the table.
When the cards stop, my mother looks up from the table and looks me in the eyes.

And just like God. And just like my father. She reaches over for me and I put myself in her arms and hold her close as she cries.

The first time I tried to kill myself, I met with God.
He sat on a throne on top of a few layers of clouds and dust and I imagine it was the same stuff he made me and you out of, because he’d sometimes twirl his hand through it and it’d glow colors like it was made of something besides water vapor.
And I stood in front of God and he looked down at me and started to ask me questions.
“Why did you try to kill yourself?” He asked. Isn’t God supposed to be omniscient? He should know already.
“It’s a stipulation of your free will,” was his response. Apparently, when we’re free, he loses the ability to see us. That explains why it’s so easy for the devil.

He asked me why again, and I didn’t quite have a real answer. I mean, he gave me a lot. Family, lovers, friends, pets, money. But hey, not everything buys happiness.
So I stood there staring at God. I stood there looking around the place where God lived. His bed looked pretty comfortable. Did he eat well?
“Have you been having complications with the lovers I gave you?”
I thought about you, because that’s where I go when I hear the L-word. No, I suppose not. There has been nothing between us that I would say makes me sad. Perhaps dissatisfied, but not unhappy.
“What about your family, are they problematic?”
I thought it all through, each member, extended and close, that I knew. Nothing came to mind. The odd thing about being around God is there’s something about him that makes your memory better.
“And your friends, aren’t they helpful?”
Yeah, they’ve pulled me out of tight spots before. I try to return the favor, but I’m not very good at it.
No, I don’t know why, God. I don’t know why I took a pair of scissors from the kitchen and cut all my hair into disgusting shreds. I don’t know why I gripped a bottle of prescription pills like it was the only thing keeping me from being swept off a waterfall. I don’t know why I counted out each pill, organized into groups of threes, and took each one. Three by three by three, swallowing the contents and hoping the chemicals leeched into my body before my stomach turned.

And God sighed and he stood up from his throne. He walked over to where I was standing in the middle of the room and took me in his arms. I could feel something wet against my cheek and I realized he was crying, and I tried to cry with him, but I couldn’t. I just sat there, a little bit uncomfortable, while he held me.
Eventually he pulled away and an adviser came over.
“Don’t come back,” God said to me, “I don’t want to have to explain this to Jesus.”
Right, because God’s a comedian.

When I woke up, my mother was stroking my hair and I was laying in a hospital bed. I could hear the beeps and whir of machines keeping me alive. You never visited me in the hospital, but you were at home when I got out.

You stopped by this morning. I know you did because the label was peeled off the milk, and I found it in the trash with your fingernail markings all over it.
And when I’m off to work, I come home and the pillow is flipped. I know you sleep there, and I keep it flipped when I go to bed at night and smell you, that last dying hint of musk.
And you left your palm print against the refrigerator door, as you leaned against it to open the trash compactor.
I know you were here this morning while I slept, and when I stalked from the living room into the kitchen and back through the bedroom, I could feel your ghost drifting through me.
And I’m also in love with you.

This afternoon I walked from the house to the park. Last time I talked to you about it you said it was such a long walk that you didn’t think I could do it. I’ve never been very active, but I wish you had more faith in me. Maybe you do, and I don’t see it, perhaps it was a warning. I don’t know. I don’t know much. I don’t know. Maybe.
The walk beat me down, and when I got back I fell against the door frame and my stomach hurt, but not from walking. My stomach hurt because I miss you. You never say hello, and you never leave a note. You are just here when I am asleep, or if I am gone. I don’t call out sick or come home early for fear that you may be angry with me.

You left hair on the comb and I picked it out and set it aside in a drawer because it’s almost you. And I started brushing with your toothbrush. The bristles are harder than I like, and it makes my gums bleed a bit every time. They get sore and bleed. I get scared of my own blood when I see it, but I keep brushing because you said the hard bristles make your gums stronger. The bleeding, you say, is good. I keep brushing because I miss your teeth.

I wrote you a poem when I got home from work yesterday and it was gone from the refrigerator door when I woke up, and that’s how I know you were here.
I sent you a letter in the mail and it never came, so that’s how I know you go through the mailbox. Your bills never show up, your credit card statements never arrive, your million dollar winning envelopes stopped coming.

I still inhale.

I found the pornography you keep under the bed, and flipped through the magazines and masturbated to the photographs inside. People were touching each other in places I couldn’t reach on my own, and you loved to look at them do it. I cried when I came and I didn’t bother putting the magazine away before I fell asleep.
When I woke up, I was under the covers in my bedclothes and I think you did it because the magazines all were gone. Even the one I had masturbated to was missing, and I want to find your new hiding spot. I want to see those people again, with their lips and tongues and their faces masks of pleasure, dying.

I want to see you one more time. You never show up, but you always pat me on the head while I sleep. I know because my hair used to never be matted when I woke up, it would always be everywhere.
I want to touch you one more time, and maybe do to you those things you seem to like. Maybe give you that part of me I never gave to anyone. Maybe kiss that spot on you that hasn’t ever been kissed. I’d like to do that to you, and have you do it back. Maybe you’d like it too? I don’t know. No. No nevermind, I can’t do that, you don’t want it, do you?
That’s why you hid the magazines.

I’m sorry.
I should never have gone through your stuff. It was stupid of me. I was just feeling so lonely, so fragile, so scared.
I was feeling so out of sorts. My head hasn’t been in the same place it normally is. Can you forgive me? I know I found the magazine. I know I should have left it where it was, and never touched it, never looked.
I know I should stop sleeping in your bed.
I know I shouldn’t brush my teeth with your brush or keep your hair in my drawer.
I’m so fucking sorry, it’s so fucking hard.
Where are you?
Please.
Please come back, I don’t know what to do. Don’t go.

I sometimes like to reattach the label on the milk, hoping you’ll take it off again, but you always wait until I buy a new one.

There is
What I want to do
What I should do
What I shouldn’t do
And what I need to do
And I know that
Either/any/all/many
Of these options would
Be pleasing to me

But overall
What I actually may
End up doing is not
Any of these things
Or at least, not all
Of them.
I may end up just doing
One,
And at least that will
Be enough

Eventually I may come
To find whether that
I have made the right
Out of all the possible
Or that maybe I have
Made the wrong out of all
The possible.

Oh well,
This decision will
Affect everything, and
I accept that responsibility.
It is My future,
My past,
And My present.
And that decision,
This decision,
That need and desire
This which will be fulfilled
And that which won’t.

These moments are mine
My moments
I am my own God.

Anne gasped.
He was almost inside her and she felt a dull pain, hard throbbing like a pressure gauge too tight around her arm. In stress she felt the muscles contracting and the pressure increased. She wished he would move fast instead of slow like she had asked.
But then he was in, and he said so, but she knew.
He moved only in small prods, aware of her clenching jaw and her sharp noises and her hand pressed against his pelvis. She didn’t even realize it was there, that she was pushing him away but also letting him in.
There were motions, movements, waves and seas and tides. She felt him squeezing her arm, tighter for a second and then for even briefer it was as if his soul had disappeared. He returned and his grip released and for the first time since she had unhooked her belt she looked him in the eyes.
He forced a smile, he was scared of some accidental nature. She tried to smile back, and felt around for her underwear.
He had it in his hands the moment her fingers touched the sheets, and for the first time he knew her.
And she could feel him still, and that part of her he had touched still burned, maybe even itched, and it was uncomfortable. She rubbed herself, but it was internal.

And then it was clearer, like a solution being run through a centrifuge.
She felt his heart beating though he stood against the door jamb, pulling at the prophylactic, trying not to upend it onto her carpet.
She could smell glycerin and latex. She could smell sweat, and then behind that something sticky. Sweet. Something solid was there, obvious in its nature, a smell that held steadfast when even the tributaries of water beaded down her bare skin.
And then that night, her head in profile against the pillow, she lay awake with that thought in her head. She twisted under the covers, knots and pretzels forming around her. Her pillow held reservoir for his scent, the soap he washed with.

The next day he called her cell phone, he jumbled the words. She said sure and soon enough she was sitting in the passenger seat of his car, going ninety down a twisting forest road. The tires gripped the tarmac, and everything swayed in the turbulence they left behind.
He pulled up to a stop sign, using his left hand to shift the car, not wanting to let atoms be atoms between their palms. They were off.
The car descended into a valley, and at the bottom he turned onto a dirt road. Rocks and gravel clicked and thrummed against the bottom of the car. She could feel the large pieces striking below her feet. He drove slow around a few pot holes, taking time to make sure the ride was smooth.
And then they arrived at the lake. They were the only ones there. A rope swing hung out over a large rock. A few bottles and cans lay near a fire pit like used wet dreams. Roots curved in and out of the earth where weeds no longer grew from being trod on.
He grabbed her arm before she could run on ahead and tried to kiss her. She pulled free, and giggled towards the water. He got towels from the back seat and followed her.
The water made goose bumps on their skin.
They swam naked in the lily pads, tugging at each others limbs and holding their feet above the soggy floor. He gripped her around the stomach, feeling his fingers dip in and out of her belly button, his hand following her patterns and shapes. She swam away, enjoying the sun above and the warm pockets underneath. They could have fallen asleep forever.
Eventually they sat in his car, the doors open, their underwear too wet to wear. They didn’t speak much, but he wanted to touch her skin. He ran a hand along her leg and closed his eyes as the wind blew past them.
Then he turned the key and they left.

They went to his house, watching for figures in the dark windows before lurching into the entryway. They hung up their underwear in the sun and they made sandwiches.

He drove her home, his fingers lacing between hers. They played music loud, the windows open, dusk air flowing across their skin.
They arrived at her house, navigating the descending driveway. They got out of the car and he walked her up the steps to her door. She hugged him goodbye and he kissed her on the forehead. They held onto each other as if this was the last time they would ever be together.
And then she disappeared into her house.

On the way back to his car he stopped to pick at the rust that was forming along the wheel wells. The black paint chipped and stained his fingers.

Summer ended. Fall arrived. As fall ended, the wind picked up. Daylight grew scarce. They saw less of each other. Everything grew cold.

He leaned against a pillow with his arm around her. She leaned against him, holding one of his hands in hers. Her fingers traced the wrinkles and lines on his palm. She ran her index finger along his lifeline.
He felt the air between them, layers of molecules bricking up between the fabric of their clothes. Atomic weight. She felt him urge to free himself. She felt the urge to run away, herself.
There was a dull pain, throbbing in his stomach. There was very little excitement left in their cause. They no longer felt rebellious, and there was nothing they could die for.
He eventually pushed her off of him. She looked up in dismay.
She asked him about friends, about life, about love and future.
“There is only one thing that’s important,” he said.
There was a pause.
“What the fuck does that mean?” she asked.
“Read the title of the story,” he replied. She went back to the beginning of the short story and read it.
“That’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever done. There is absolutely no point in looping back to a title just to make some sort of statement or point. Just say, ‘Hey, at least we tried, baby, but it’s over.’ Stop being clever. Anyway, we’ve been broken up for what, half a year now? Get over it already, move on, find someone new. You couldn’t say goodbye then, when you really wanted to, but when I said it, when I put it out there that we should part ways, you fought it. It’s what you want, isn’t it? Just say it, just say it’s over.”
“Ok. It’s over. We tried, but it’s not working out.”
“Good, the door’s right over there.”

Here is your face
Solid and soft
I’ll cradle it in my
Fingers, and sorry
About my rough hands
They work more than
You might think.

Here is your grip
Strong and gentle
And I’ll slip
My fingers through yours
And the cracks in my
palm will match
Yours.

Here is your love
Good and bad
It makes you you
You know.
And I’ll take it.

This is a song I wrote with a friend of mine, Nick Perry (he recorded both guitar lines). It’s based on a couple chords from a song I wrote, but it’s pretty much his composition from my standpoint, the guitar line is the centerpiece and everything else sorrounds it.

The drum kit is handmade using boxes and something I found to simulate the noise of a ride cymbal. I don’t have $300 for a cheap kit, certainly not $500 for a decent kit, but I do have a few bucks here and there for this. For the snare sound, I filled a pizza box with rice, and hit that. The bass drum, I had to tape and rubberband a sock around the end of my drum stick, and hit it against a syrup box from those soda fountain machines.

There’s no lyrics, but it’d make a good intro to some other song. It’s sort of 50s. You can download a copy here.

You’re like a “wind in the willows” kind of person
And by that I mean
Windy, breezy, easy,
(like easy-going)
but not sleazy(ZZYY)
And with willows you kind of like to just
Hang out
And maybe you’re often found near a river … — …
Where moles ride by in boats, making friends,
With toads. (But not in moats, this ain’t no rhyme time)
Do you make friends with toads?

Here’s the second half of the poem:
You’ve got it made, like really made
Washing-machine-swisher-made, like
Koolaid-cool like Dennis Quaid
Get the switch? It’s a bait for your mind,
So don’t forget, yeah yeah yeah!
And here’s a kicker,
I won’t drop oil in your river,
So sopping soaked seals, struggling to breathe,
They’ll be safe, you’re safe, safe like
Milk
Unless someone’s allergic, then it’s not safe.
So, that’s probably a bad
Simile.

Ok, here’s the third half:
Just kidding, the poem ends
Here.
^ The poem ended up there.