Nanci Griffith

[fox69]

"Tell Me How"

"Tell Me How"


Tell me how to keep your love
You know how I need your love
Tell me how you keep the love
Within your heart from me

Don't you know that I love you
Let me show why, I'm true blue
When I know a love is true
Don't keep your love for me

If you would say to me today
The time for love is now
Could I sway your love my way
Then I say, "Tell me how"

Tell me how to keep your love
You know how I need your love
Tell me how you keep the love
Within your heart from me

[Instrumental Break]

Tell me how to keep your love
You know how I need your love
Tell me how you keep the love
Within your heart from me

If you would say to me today
The time for love is now
Could I sway your love my way
Then I say, "Tell me how"

Tell me how to keep your love
You know how I need your love
Tell me how you keep the love
Within your heart from me

[Instrumental Break]

Tell me how you keep the love
Within your heart from me

 

[fox69]

"Ten Degrees And Getting Colder"

"Ten Degrees And Getting Colder"


He was standing by the highway
With a sign that just said Mother
When he heard a driver coming
About a half a mile away
So he held the sign up higher
Where no decent soul could miss it
It was ten degrees or colder
Down by Boulder Dam that day

He was raised up in Milwaukee
Though he never was that famous
He was just a road musician
To the taverns he would go
Singing songs about the ramblin'
The lovin' girls and gamblin'
How the world fell on his shoulders
Back in Boulder I don't know

[Chorus:]
And she told him she would take him
For a ride in the morning sun
Back in Boulder he had told her
I don't know when, I've had a better friend

It was out in Arizona
That he heard the lady listening
To each word that he was saying
To each line that he would write
So he sat down at her table
And they talked about the weather
98.6 and rising down by Boulder Dam that night

[Chorus]

Now he's traded off his Martin
Though his troubles aren't all over
His feet are almost frozen and the sun is sinking low
Won't you listen to me Brother, if you ever loved your Mother
Please pull off on the shoulder, if you're goin' Milwaukee way
It's ten degrees and getting colder down by Boulder Dam today

 

[fox69]

"Tequila After Midnight"

"Tequila After Midnight"


Tequila after midnight drives loneliness away
Makes strangers all around you look familiar
And tequila after midnight makes you feel so warm
Makes you think you feel good when you don't

It's the same sad familiar story
Not a thing about it is new
Just about someone who loved and lost
And it's still hurting through and through

They say it drives you crazy, well I could hardly care
For quite some time now that's just where I've been
And they say tequila kills you if you drink too much
Lord, I hope they make tequila long enough

It's the same sad familiar story
Not a damn thing about it is new
Just about someone who loved and lost
And it's still hurting through and through

Oh, they say it drives you crazy, well I could hardly care
For quite some time now that's just where I've been
And they say tequila kills you if you drink too much
Lord, I hope they make tequila long enough
Lord, I hope they make tequila long enough

 

[fox69]

"The Flyer"

"The Flyer"


He was a flyer for the Air Force
On a plane from San Antonio
I was traveling to London
He was going off to Buffalo
Changing planes in Pittsburgh
We got grounded in a storm
And, I would give anything
To be on that flyer's arm

We played cards, mostly blackjack
As we sat out on the tarmac
We sang songs we knew in Spanish
As we both loved songs of language
He'd heard me on the radio
I'd seen the flyers of San Antone
And, I would give anything
To have that flyer for my own

[Chorus:]
God bless the flyer
Who would be flying home tonight
Cuz' I would give anything
To see that flyer, flyin' tonight

He said he'd never married
Cuz, his heart was in the clouds
And I said I was too clumsy
That I broke the wings of the loves I found
He shouted out his name to me
As I ran to make my flight
I would give anything
To see that flyer, flyin' tonight

One year I watched a war in London
In the airport leaving London
And I wondered if I'd know him
If I saw his wings in motion
Did I leave my heart in Pittsburgh...
In the lightning of that flight?
I wish that you could tell me now
Will he be flyin' home tonight?

[Chorus 2x]

 

[fox69]

"The Ghost Inside Of Me"

"The Ghost Inside Of Me"


Every prayer that I'm not praying, and every promise I'm betraying
Every price that I am paying, is like a ghost inside of me
Every road I could be taking, every dream I am forsaking
Every heart that's out there breaking, is like a ghost inside of me

Look around, around, look around
Every time I turn around
I'm not who I ought to be
Down, down, it gets me down
Every time I look around
There is something haunting me

Every friend I am deserting, and every danger I am flirting
Every word that ends up hurting, is like a ghost inside of me
Every heart I could be cheering, and every love that I am fearing
Every cry I am hearing, is like a ghost inside of me

Look around, around, look around
Every time I turn around
I'm not who I ought to be
Down, down, it gets me down
Every time I look around
There is something haunting me

Every tear that I'm not crying, and every pain I am denying
Every lie I'm justifying, is like a ghost inside of me
Like a ghost inside of me
Like a ghost inside of me
Like a ghost inside of me

 

[fox69]

"The Last Of The True Believers"

"The Last Of The True Believers"


Oh, he said it was the sound of the winter callin'
From up around the bend
Or it could be the cry of your restless heart
For the love of your long lost friends
Me, I think it's just the summertime and the heat of these Texas winds
They keep on slappin' my face with dust so thick
That the tears won't roll again

[Chorus:]
Last of the true believers
Have you grown weary all alone?
You could go home again...home again...home
Last of the true believers
You pack your things and go back home
You could go home again...home again...home

Oh he said, "you can't stay away forever
'cause they say love doesn't last that long
And the ghost of the one that you loved the best is bound to be long gone
So you fall for the one you believe in and take pride in the heart you hold
'Cause when the wintertime pounds upon your door...
It's shelter from the cold".

[Chorus]

There's a shadow on our wall where I once stood with him in mind
And there is an empty space beside him
Where I do take my rest at night
Oh, I will be the last of the true believers... if truth is his heart to lend
'Cause the wintertime sure looks cold to me... comin' up around the bend

[Chorus]

Oh, I could go home again... home again... home
Well, it looks like home again... home again... home
Oh, I could go home again... home again... home
Well, he brings me home again... home again... home...

 

[fox69]

"The Loving Kind"

"The Loving Kind"


They were the loving kind
She was black and he was white
In Virginia nineteen fifty-eight
They found love amongst the hate

Well the law said they could not wed
They married anyway
The sheriff put them both in jail
Separated 'till they made their bail

They changed the heart of a nation
with their wedding vows
From the highest court in the land
Their union would lawfully stand
Simply Mildred and Richard
That's how they'll be remembered
They proved that love is truly blind
They were the loving kind.

The Lovings lived a quiet life
In their Virginia home
and while the case worked it's way through the courts
They brought three children to this world
Richard died in seventy-five
Mildred kept their love alive
'Till the spring of two thousand-eight
Fifty years beyond the hate

They changed the heart of a nation
with their wedding vows
From the highest court in the land
Their union would lawfully stand
Simply Mildred and Richard
That's how they'd be remembered
They proved that love is truly blind
They were the loving kind.

 

[fox69]

"The Power Lines"

"The Power Lines"


Nobody seems to care about you
With your tool case by the roadside
There beneath the power lines
Or the pallor of your skin
Paled beneath fluorescent lights
In a Greyhound station's cruel midnight
Where you can't afford the ride

[Chorus:]
Oh, the power lines
They go from sea to sea
They carry voices
Love from him to me
The power lines you fall beneath
Are the rainbows you can't climb
And you will not climb the power lines
You are lost beneath the power lines

There's no place that you haven't been
And no place that you call your home
There's no place that you cannot go
With the gift within your hands
And the tools to build another's dream
That connects them to the power lines
You do not feel you need

[Chorus 2x]

 

[fox69]

"The Streets Of Baltimore"

"The Streets Of Baltimore"


I sold the farm to take my woman
Where she longed to be
We left our kin and all our friends
Back there in Tennessee
I bought the one way tickets
She had often begged me for
And they took us to the streets of Baltimore

[Bridge:]
[1st section:]
Well my heart was filled with laughter
When I saw those city lights
She said the prettiest place on earth
Was Baltimore at night
[2nd section:]
Well a man feels proud to give his woman
What she's longing for
And I kind of like the Streets of Baltimore

I got myself a factory job,
I ran an old machine
We bought a little cottage
In a neighborhood serene
But every night when I come home
With every muscle sore
She would drag me through the Streets of Baltimore

[Bridge:]
[1st section:]
Well, I did my best to bring her back
To what she used to be
But, I soon learned she loved those bright lights
Much more than she loves me
[2nd section:]
Now I'm goin' back on that same train
That brought me here before
While my baby walks the streets of Baltimore

Yes, my baby walks the streets of Baltimore

 

[fox69]

"The Sun, Moon, And Stars"

"The Sun, Moon, And Stars"


The sun, the moon and the stars
They make the wind blow
It took me twenty years to understand
Lost to me are how the lives of friends go
Like autumn leaves in Oklahoma wind
But it made me strong to be on my own
It never did me no harm to live all alone
Oh, but now and then
In the color of the evening
Drunken in a barroom
With a fan turning
I've come to miss a few

This afternoon was cloudy and the rains came
Third day of my first day San Miguel
Seems lately that I'm doubling as Storm bait
I've been followed like a shadow through the dell
But it made me strong to be on my own
It never did me no harm to live all alone
Oh, but now and then
In the color of the evening
Drunken in a barroom
With a fan turning
I've come to miss a few

Dear friends and relations
See what I have done
I've gathered all my fingers in one place
They breathe a breath that's deadly stale
Since they tooled a song for me
I guess mechanics never really set the pace
Cause I'm back and I'm strong
I'm here on my own
It never did me no harm
To live all alone
Oh, but now and then
In the color of the evening
Drunken in a barroom
With a fan turning
I've come to miss a few

The sun, the moon and the stars
They make the wind blow
It took me twenty years to understand
But lost to me are how the lives of friends go
Like autumn leaves in Oklahoma wind
...oh, but now and then
It's in the color of the evening
Drunken in a barroom
With a fan turning
I'll come to miss a few