[Intro]
G C D G
[Verse]
G C G
Meriden months stuck in Indian summers.
D G D G
And Dad's on the line, but I'm fine. Here's the phone...
G
Oh, it's floating away. It's going away on the tide.
G C G
Crystalized wishes, like kids crying for Christmases,
D G D G
ticking off lists with their pens in their fists
G
before floating away, and going away on the tide.
[Chorus]
D
Running away on the back of a beast,
C
in a midnight charge down a broken beach.
Am7 G
The little stars, they spin the sharpest shards of light on down
D
to the mouth of the sea.
C
In a morning curled up in a cab on the edge of the world,
Am7 G
the light's a fire of gold lying around.
[Verse]
G C G
What, when you heard it - say, forward or furtive,
D G D G
transferred through a person or mystical blur -
G
got you going away, got you floating away on the tide?
G C G
Through Bonner Road basements of Pitfall, of cave-ins,
D G D G
of crackling tapes, cross fades... When the song ends
G
I'm going away, floating away on the tide.
[Chorus]
D
Finding your way down the bloody beach,
C
with the burnt-out cars salt-licked by the sea,
Am7 G
those slicked-out stars all screaming from a distant high remove.
D
In the fizzed-out snow of a cathode screen
C
I saw a broken ghost in an old soap scene.
Am7 G
I let his dead and dreamy eyes follow my moves.
[Verse]
G C G
And I had a vision of everything hidden
D G D G
but always around me. It fought me. It found me
G
while going away, floating away on the tide.
G C G
Shooting through time with my eyes getting glassy
D G D G
and lined, while I watch seasons rocketing past me.
G
They're going away - a little more every day, all the time.
[Chorus]
D
On a balcony, at the brilliant sea
C
where all rivers meet, a voice spoke to me and said,
Am7 G
These things have just got to be. I don't know why.
[Outro]
And I said,
D
Here's to the freeway flasher!
C
Here's to the desperate dasher.
G
Guard him. Keep him from crashing,
D
on his tear. I know you think you miss him.
C
I know you think you knew him,
G
but you were passing through him.
D G D G
Light as air he's leaving. There... he's gone.