I turn my back to the wind
To catch my breath,
Before I start off again.
Driven on,
Without a moment to spend
To pass an evening
With a drink and a friend

I let my skin get too thin
I'd like to pause,
No matter what I pretend
Like some pilgrim!
Who learns to transcend!
Learns to live
As if each step was the end

Time stand still!
I'm not looking back
But I want to look around me now
See more of the people
And the places that surround me now

Freeze this moment a little bit longer
Make each sensation a little bit stronger
Experience slips away...

I turn my face to the sun
Close my eyes.
Let my defences down!
All those wounds
That I can't get unwound

I let my past go too fast
No time to pause!
If I could slow it all down
Like some captain,
Whose ship runs aground!
I can wait until the tide comes around

Make each impression a little bit stronger
Freeze this motion a little bit longer
The innocence slips away...

Summer's going fast,
Nights growing colder
Children growing up!
Old friends growing older
Experience slips away..
 

It went right by me!
At the time it went over my head
I was looking out the window
I should have looked at your face instead

It went right by me!
Just another wall
There should have been a moment
When we let our barriers fall
I never meant what you're thinking!
That is not what I meant at all...

Well I guess we all have these feelings
We can't leave unreconciled
Some of them burned on our ceilings
Some of them learned as a child
The things that we're concealing
Will never let us grow
Time will do its healing
You've got to let it go

Closed for my protection!
Open to your scorn
Between these two directions
My heart is sometimes torn

I lie awake with my secrets
spinning around my head
something that somehow escaped me!
Something you shouldn't have said
I was looking out the window
I should have looked at your face instead...

I find no absolution
In my rational point of view
Maybe some things are instinctive
But there's one thing you could do
You could try to understand me!
I could try to understand you...
  

A memo to a higher office
Open letter to the powers-that-be
To a God, a king, a head of state
A captain of industry
To  the movers and the shakers!
Can't everybody see?

It ought to be second nature!
I mean, the places where we live!
Let's talk about this sensibly!
We're not insensitive
I know progress has no patience!
But something's got to give

I know you're different!
You know I'm the same
We're both too busy
To be taking the blame
I'd like some changes
But you don't have the time
We can't go on thinking
It's a victimless crime
No one is blameless
But we're all without shame
We fight the fire!
While we're feeding the flames

Folks have got to make choices!
And choices got to have voices
Folks are basically decent
Conventional wisdom would say
Well, we read about the exceptions
In the papers every day

It ought to be second nature!
At least, that's what I feel
"Now I lay me down in Dreamland"!
I know perfect's not for real
I thought we might get closer!
But I'm ready to make a deal

Today is different,
And tomorrow the same
It's hard to take the world
The way that it came
Too many rapids
Keep us sweeping along
Too many captains
Keep on steering us wrong
It's hard to take the heat!
It's hard to lay blame
To fight the fire!
While we're feeding the flames
  

I don't want to face
The killer instinct!
Face it in your or me

We carry a sensitive cargo
Below the waterline!
Ticking like a time bomb
With a primitive design

Behind the finer feelings!
This civilized veneer!
The heart of a lonely hunter
Guards a dangerous frontier

The balance can sometimes fail!
Strong emotions can tip the scale!

Don't want to silence
A desperate voice
For the sake of security
No one wants to make a terrible choice
On the price of being free
I don't want to face the killer instinct!
Face it in you or me
So we keep it under lock and key...

It's not a matter of mercy
It's not a matter of laws
Plenty of people will kill you for some fanatical cause

It's not a matter of conscience!
A search for probable cause
It's just a matter of instinct! a matter of fatal flaws

No reward for resistance
No assistance!
No applause...

We don't want to be victims
on that we all agree,
so we lock up the killer instinct!
and throw away the key...
 

Hold your fire!
Keep it burning bright
Hold the flame 'til the dream ignites!
A spirit with a vision is a dream with a mission

I hear their passionate music
Read the words that touch my heart
I gaze at their feverish pictures
The secrets that set them apart

When I feel the powerful visions
Their fire has made alive
I wish I had that instinct!
I wish I had that drive

Spirits fly on dangerous missions
Imaginations on fire
Focused high on soaring ambitions
Consumed in a single desire

In the grip of a nameless possession!
A slave to the drive of obsession!
A spirit with a vision
Is a dream with a mission...

I watch their images flicker
Bringing light to a lifeless screen
I walk through their beautiful buildings
And I wish I had their dreams

But dreams don't need to have motion
To keep their spark alive
Obsession has to have action!
Pride turns on the drive

It's cold comfort
To the ones without it
To know how they struggled!
How they suffered about it

If their lives were exotic and strange
They would likely have gladly exchanged them
For something a little more plain
Maybe something a little more sane

We each pay a fabulous price
For our visions of paradise
But a spirit with a vision
Is a dream with a mission...
  

Nothing can survive in a vacuum
No one can exist all alone
We pretend things only happen to strangers
We've all got problems of our own

It's enough to learn to share our pleasures
We can't sooth pain with sympathy
All that we can do is be reminded!
We shake our heads at the tragedy

Every day we're standing in a time capsule
Racing down a river from the past
Every day we're standing in a wind tunnel
Facing down the future coming fast

It's just the age
It's just a stage!
We disengage!
We turn the page...

Looking at the long-range forecast
Catching all the names in the news
Checking out the state of the nation
Learning the environmental blues

Truth is after all a moving target
Hairs to split, and pieces that don't fit
How can anybody be enlightened?
Truth is after all so poorly lit
  

When the waters rose in the darkness
In the wake of the endless flood
It flowed into our memory!
It flowed into our blood!

When something broke the surface
Just to see the starry dome!
We still feel that relation
When the water takes us home
In the flying spray of the ocean
The water takes you home!

Springing from the weight of the mountains
Like the heart of the earth would burst
Flowing out from marble fountains
In the dreams of a desert thirst

Something swam through the jungles
Where the mighty rivers roam!
Something breaks the silence
When the water takes you home
I hear the wordless voices
When the water takes me home!

Waves that crash on the shoreline
Torrents of tropical rain streaming down
Beyond our memory
Streaming down inside our veins

When something left the ocean
To crawl high above the foam!
We still feel that elation
When the water takes us home
In a driving rain of redemption
The water takes me home...