Memory is like an anchor on the soul,
like a ball and chain on the soul,
like a flowing wound,
like a vampire on the brain
sucking away the best times,
sucking away the joy,
sucking away the days.

Forgetting is freedom.
It’s a pardon for the guy who’s guilty
as hell, a soothing blessed amnesia.
Forgetting is walking away quietly
when no one else is watching.
No one has to know; no one does.
You don’t need to suffer for everything.

There’s a stone you don’t need to roll.
There’s a bag you don’t have to haul.
There’s a scene you don’t have to play.
You’ll never float with all that weight.
You’ll never learn to fly.
You’ll never climb the mountaintops,
never touch the sky.

Let me take only the taste of love,
take only at the end of the day
the peace that I said what I could say.
Let me take away only my name –
Nothing else – sky clad and shorn.
Naked as a jay bird – light as a feather,
Naked as the day I was born.

Do I know you? Have we met?
Sorry – it seems I’ve forgotten your name.
Do I owe you money? Borrow a tool?
Did I offend your sister? Call you a fool?
Sorry – I really don’t remember a thing.
I wasn’t there –
Didn’t see anything.

You must have me confused
with some other lucky guy,
someone who fell from another sky.
Your face is kind of familiar –
I’m sure that I would recall –
like a face I saw in in a dream.
Maybe we never knew each other at all –