Rafters

Ceiling tiles are falling down Selling secrets between now And defeated pasts on last defense The walls can't keep the warm in here This busted house of cans of beer Aluminum, some plaster and some fear There are her bones, there are the fossils There near the sewer pipe There, between floors, between wars There on a two-by-four Harmonic notes still humming from her lyre Just set my little soul on fire In the shape of my latest sin In the wake of soon moving on Though this house is crumbling down She's whispering her last words now Did he love her there on the floor? When he pressed his mark in that knotted board Pressed an oath in that knotted board Just two names, one shape, tangled minor chords A heart around their sweet accord Wrapped around their love and stored The first day, got away, then so many more A decade past, and then a score And now winter falls, decay and dark creating art Showing the world just where you really are Oh, sweet Louise Since eighty-three While paneling and pyramids fall down Oh, sweet Louise Now I believe In rafters in this beat-up, blue-neck town In turning tides, in me In hidden vows There are her bones, there are the fossils There near the sewer pipe There are her bones, there are the fossils Unfinished song I complete There on his throne, here in their castle My Pygmalion ivory Here on my own, like this home The landlord collects his fee I'm growing old, I'm so alone These ceiling tiles are falling down I'm seeing what I've got to see Oh, sweet Louise Since eighty-three While paneling and pyramids fall down Oh, sweet Louise Now I believe In rafters in a rugged Worcester town In turning tides, in me In hidden vows