Jackson Browne

Jeff and I saw Jackson Browne in concert the other night. He performed at Boulder's Fox Theatre, an intimate hole-in-the-wall that holds no more than a couple hundred people. We were ten feet from the stage as Leo Kottke and Mike Gordon (former Phish bassist) warmed up and Browne sang a two-hour set. It was wunderbar. There were many highlights, including a moving rendition of "Lives in the Balance," songs during which bluegrass band Nickel Creek came out and joined Browne onstage—and an extended acoustic version of "The Pretender." My favorite moment of the evening, however, was hearing the song, "Sky Blue and Black." It actually made me cry. I don't know why, but the older I get, the more I catch myself pausing in the middle of experiences and shooting mental freeze frames. I think to myself, "This hour here in this room with these people, this collective body heat, these rhythms, these lyrics and these sensations—like individual snowflakes—will never, ever occur exactly like this again. " Which is why I wanted to savor every word of "Sky Blue and Black"—along with certain memories and yearnings it conjures...

Sky Blue and Black

In the calling out to one another
Of the lovers up and down the strand
In the sound of the waves and the cries
Of the seagulls circling the sand
In the fragments of the songs
Carried down the wind from some radio
In the murmuring of the city in the distance
Ominous and low
I hear the sound of the world where we played
And the far too simple beauty
Of the promises we made

If you ever need holding
Call my name, I’ll be there
If you ever need holding
And no holding back, I’ll see you through
Sky blue and black

Where the touch of the lover ends
And the soul of the friend begins
There’s a need to be separate and a need to be one
And a struggle neither wins
Where you gave me the world I was in
And a place I could make a stand
I could never see how you doubted me
When I’d let go of your hand
Yeah, and I was much younger then
And I must have thought that I would know
If things were going to end
And the heavens were rolling
Like a wheel on a track
And our sky was unfolding
And it’ll never fold back
Sky blue and black

And I’d have fought the world for you
If I thought that you wanted me to
Or put aside what was true or untrue
If I’d known that’s what you needed
What you needed me to do
But the moment has passed by me now
To have put away my pride
And just come through for you somehow

If you ever need holding
Call my name, I’ll be there
If you ever need holding
And no holding back, I’ll see you through
You’re the color of the sky
Reflected in each store-front window pane
You’re the whispering and the sighing
Of my tires in the rain
You’re the hidden cost and the thing that’s lost
In everything I do
Yeah and I’ll never stop looking for you
In the sunlight and the shadows
And the faces on the avenue
That’s the way love is

That’s the way love is
That’s the way love is
Sky blue and black