1)   death of a hobo  -                           for notes on this song, click here




2)   give me your love  -  my 'nanny',  my mother's mom, was always 'old'.  she was old when i was a boy.  so she just got improbably older and older as i grew into manhood.  she was also always sick.  not so sick she couldn't clean her pin-neat little apartment from top to bottom with a toothbrush every day of the week even if she had to crawl to do it.   she was also not too sick to complain quite a bit.  it was her way. her husband passed away the year i was born.  so my nanny Mueller had always said she wanted to die,  so she could join him in heaven.  that was her life in a nutshell, and it just went on and on.  one got to thinking it was Jesus idea of humor not to 'take her home' as she wished,  and end her mortal misery.

and then one year, maybe '69, she got really sick and had to go to the hospital.  my wife lynne and i went to see her.  she looked like hell.  i thought she was actually going to die.  her face looked like a skull with skin stretched over it.

she didn't die of course.  she fully recovered and lived another 35 years or so.  she finally did die at age 97.
my uncle said they could have saved her.  but i think he was kind of glad they let her go.  she didn't like him either.  

nanny Mueller was very kind to me as a child.  even on days when she told everyone else she was 'sick'.  i loved her a lot.

i wrote this song for her in 1976.  for her and my grandpa Carl.  they're together at last.




3)   how could i ever leave you  -              for notes on this song, click here




4)   indian summer  -       written for j. probst.   see note for 'how could i ever leave you'  here
 



5)   jigsaw poet's revenge  -   by '77 i was sort of 'commuting' to the east coast preparing to relocate.   i had given up my apt. in Chicago.   i was staying with friends a lot.  half homeless, i guess.  i spent a lot of time on Greyhound buses between gigs.  on one of these bus rides, a pretty young Asian women caught my eye.  at some point i must have smiled at her, but she just returned a very unpleasant scowl.   she got off at the next town.   which gave me the idea for a song, in which i was able to put to use the refrain from another song by Thom Bishop, which he had ripped off a tombstone in southern Illinois.  i also threw in bits and pieces from 2 or 3 Dylan songs that came to hand.  hence the title.   i had quite a lot of fun with this.  and nobody sued.  yet.




6)   ring of keys  -                                for notes on this song, click here