C


[Verse]
F                   C                               Dm             Bb
What a day we had… I figured I’d be feeling bad, but I don’t feel a thing.
              Dm            Bb              C
They read from Mark and then bring us all up Shingle Camp Hill Road.
F                      C                                Dm                Bb
Throwing flowers at the ground felt like hours, with the grown-ups whimpering.
      Dm                 Bb               Eb                  Bb
In the blown-out green of spring I see the whole small town explode.


[Chorus]
C                                                                Bb                Dm      Bb
And then driving to our house at night, the stars shoot out their shine behind the Olds windows.
         Dm               Bb             Dm                 Bb                   C
My father quiet behind the wheel, I fully feel that he knows where he’s trying to go.
C                                                        Bb                    Dm   Bb
And then they carry me inside, this other world behind my eyes, this bright-lit neon glow.
             Dm            Bb               Dm                   Bb    C
And then it’s morning everywhere, and summer air, and there’s the stereo.


[Interlude]
Eb Bb


[Verse]
F                        C                           Dm                  Bb
The Electric Company was playing when my mom left me five minutes on the couch,
          Dm                 Bb              C
and I was blue when she came out, and wasn't breathing.
F                            C                            Dm                 Bb
That Opel flew through town, all down 120, and around the Lebanon green, and out.
             Dm                      Bb                  Eb         Bb
I don't know what they were thinking about. I don't want to imagine it.


[Chorus]
C                                                      Bb     Dm    Bb
In came the doctor, wearing white. Carefully, he cut a circle in my throat
           Dm             Bb                 Dm                   Bb        C
and took a little plastic tube and looped it through my lungs and sealed me closed.
C                                                          Bb                Dm     Bb
My parents were called into the room, with no idea what to do but frightened to say so.
                 Dm              Bb                   Dm            Bb               C
They showed them how to clean it out, and showed them how to set me down, and sent me home.


[Verse]
F          C                         Bb         Dm   Bb
1983 - the apparition came to me and spoke to me all night,
       Dm             Bb                     C
frozen inside my bed, bone-white, my brother fast asleep.
F                     C                                   Bb       Dm    Bb
And, under surgery, a second time it came and showed me a house in outer space,
        Dm             Bb              Dm                  Bb
another boy who had my face, a mom and dad who weren't the same...
                 Eb             Bb
I woke up and my aunt gave me a book.


[Chorus]
C                                                             Bb                Dm           Bb
Show me the neatest place to hide, to crawl inside the silver gym. Don't tell a single other soul.
            Dm             Bb             Dm             Bb         C
Beneath the bleachers is a lighter, and a sneaker, and a frozen sparrow.
C                                                       Bb                   Dm        Bb
I broke into the church at night and pulled out all the stops and heard that organ overload,
    Dm                           Bb               Dm                Bb              C
and  screamed, This giant clashy chord is for Our Lord. Up where he is. Up Where he goes.


[Outro]
C            Dm      Dsus4
Up that music floats,
C                          Dm
leaving family, friends and home down so small below.
              Bb
And it's still there for all I know.