Dan Mangan - Tragic Turn of Events / Move Pen Move

Short preamble since this is my first post: My friend Nic (www.quagmus.com) suggested that I start a blog about songs that I enjoy. He and I have gotten into discussions about different songs and I guess he thought it would be cool to share my thoughts with a larger audience, so here is my first post. Hopefully some people will be introduced to some new music as I do more of these posts.

The first song I have picked is a collaboration between Dan Mangan and Shane Koyczan titled Tragic Turn of Events / Move Pen Move. The song can be heard on Dan Mangan's website (http://www.danmanganmusic.com/site/chameleonplayer_pop_up.html) track 14. Shane Koyczan's poem tells the story of a son and his dying mother. Combined with the music from Dan Mangan, I think it provides a very authentic emotionalism; not overdone, but still very affecting.

My favorite bit from the poem; an amazing analogy of the feelings of losing a loved one. (3:56ish):

"But my mother just motions to a bottle full of answers and says 'Help me go'

And now I know something of how a piano must feel

When it looks at the fireplace to see sheet music being used for kindling

Smoke signaling the end of some song that I thought it would take too long to learn

So I just sit here watching you burn away

All those notes I never had a chance to play to hear the music of what you had to say"

Below is the full text of the poem:

"

'Stay…'

That’s what Mothers say when their sons and daughters go away they say stay

My Mother said go

So I wasn't there

The night she fell out of her chair, so frustrated that she amputated her own legs or rather tried to

With a steak knife

Her life leaking onto the white floor blossoming like

Roses in the snow.

Our relationship was an anthem composed of words like

'Gotta go'

So we went

And sent our regards on postcards from the places we’ve been

With stories about all the things we've seen that’s how it was with you and I

Why say goodbye when we could still write

And then it took your hands

We should have practiced our goodbyes

Because then it took your eyes

And I was somewhere in the middle of nowhere watching the sun rise over a stop sign placed down the center line of a highway filled with sudden turns for the worse

Running back home cause I gotta play nurse

Gotta figure out which pill alleviates which pain

Which part of your brain is being used for a boxing bag as your body became a never ending game of freeze tag taking place in an empty playground I was left looking for your limbs in a lost and found and I couldn't set you free

So we just sat there

Our heads bent towards each other like flowers in the small hours of the morning while light wandered in like a warning that time is passing, and you right along with it, bit by bit everyday

And all I could say is 'If I could I would write you someway out of this, but my gift is useless…' And you said 'No…

Write me a poem to make me happy'

I wrote 'Move Pen Move.'

'Write me a bedroom where cures make love to our cancers'

But my mother just motions to a bottle full of answers and says 'Help me go'

And now I know something of how a piano must feel

When it looks at the fireplace to see sheet music being used for kindling

Smoke signaling the end of some song that I thought it would take too long to learn

So I just sit here watching you burn away

All those notes I never had a chance to play to hear the music of what you had to say

But I count out the pills

Just to see if I can do it

And I can’t even get half way through it before I turn back into your son and say 'Stay'

I could hook up my heart to your ears and let my tears be your morphine drip

And maybe its easier to let you slip away than it is to say 'good bye' So I

Hold my breath

Because in the countdown to death the question of why melts into when

How much time do we have left because if I knew what I know now then - Move Pen Move write me a mountain

Because headstones are not big enough

And my mother says 'Stop it…

Write me a poem to make me happy'

So I write this

'Stay…'

She smiles and says

'Gotta go'

'I know… Goodbye…'"