The exercise:
Write something that has to do with: don't look back.
Mine is a song that was inspired by a TV show Kat and I have been watching on Netflix. It got stuck in my head while I was working in the garden today, so I figured I should probably get it out - at least as much of it as I can remember.
I'm not going to say which one, because it's mildly embarrassing to admit that I've written a song based on any TV show, much less this one. So feel free to guess but I won't be responding to any of them.
Spent this morning and evening picking strawberries. There are still more to be picked tomorrow morning. Pretty sure my back is about to go on strike.
Mine:
Don't look back when you walk away
Please baby please
Just keep looking straight ahead
And I hope that you'll see
Somebody's waiting for you there
And he's a whole lot better than me
A whole lot better than me
A whole lot better than me
We're still young enough
For me to say
We've got a lot more tomorrows
Than we had yesterdays
So don't waste your time thinking about
All that went wrong
It's too far away now
Yeah it's long gone
Keep your eyes on the horizon
And keep carrying on
Yeah keep carrying on
Just carry on
Don't look back when you walk away
Please baby please
Keep looking straight ahead
And I hope that you'll see
Somebody's waiting for you there
And he's a whole lot better than me
A whole lot better than me
Yeah so much better than me
Our lips already said
Their goodbyes
I don't wanna say it again
With our eyes
I don't think
I'd survive
So remember me
As the guy
Who stood strong
In his lie
Not the one who's watching you go
And starting to cry
Just don't look back when you walk away
Please baby please
Keep looking straight ahead
And I hope that you'll see
Somebody's waiting for you there
And he's a whole lot better than me
A whole lot better than me
So much better than me
Please baby please
Don't look back
Oh, don't look back at me
3 comments:
Wow, you gave us a whole song today! I'm impressed :) I quite like that you modify the refrain just a little bit each time you sing it, and that the despair in it steadily increases; from a strong "don't look back" to a weepy "oh just look back a little bit". I don't know much about writing lyrics generally though, so I can't really offer particularly constructive criticism, just to say that I think I'd listen to this if it were a song.
Of course, you haven't specified the musical genre... so I'm going with opera :) As I don't watch much TV, and I probably don't see any Canadian shows, I'd be hard pressed to guess where it came from. But I reckon it was probably a kids show.
Don't look back
"Did you really say '50 points for a pedestrian?" Danny's driving examiner was still shaking and had the off-grey pallor of a day-old corpse as he looked at Danny.
"It was a joke," said Danny, smiling. It still sounded defensive, even to him.
"I might have believed you," said the examiner, stuttering a little over the 'b', "if you hadn't clearly hit at least two."
"That's allowed though, right?" said Danny. His sense of unease was growing; the examiner didn't look like he was going to say yes.
"No," said the examiner. "It's illegal. It's murder in fact, and I think you've forced me to be an accessory to it."
"Uh," said Danny.
"What on earth makes you think you can run people down?" The examiner's voice was faint, and a sensitive person might have realised the question was rhetorical. Danny, who wore Doc Martens, loomed over people at 6'5 tall and occasionally broke things without noticing, didn't.
"Prissy," he said.
"What?"
"Prissy. Aunt Priscilla. Well, great-aunt actually, but that's probably not important." The examiner shook his head, and a couple of newly white hairs fell out. "She taught me to drive, and she always gets a couple of pedestrians on the way."
The examiner stared. "My god," he said. "You were taught to drive by the Roadrager herself?"
"The who?"
"The Roadrager! He or she has been killing people for nearly fifteen years! And you're saying she taught you to drive...." He fell silent for a moment, contemplating the monster he had in the car. Then he looked up and met Danny's eyes. "What's the first thing she taught you about driving?" he asked.
"Don't look back," said Danny promptly.
"That... that explains so much...."
As I approached the door to the back alley entrance, I smelled the faint acrid wafting of tobacco. Sure enough, a glance downward revealed a half-smothered cigarette near the edge of the dumpster. I sighed. Dumb kid.
There was a gasp of breath before he lunged himself at me from behind the dumpster. With ease, my hands found his collar, clasped together behind his neck, and pulled his scrawny body to my left side. I then pulled him his chest into my raised knee. Then again. After the third knee, I released my clench hold and waited. With my hands shoved into my pockets.
Jimmy was bent over, breathing heavily. He coughed a few times, then spit about a tablespoon of blood out of his mouth, the deep red looking like black tar in the low light of the alley.
“H—how?” he rasped.
“How I knew you were there?”
He nodded, his breath still coming in rasps.
“For starters, you should stop smoking if you want to be in this line of work. Cigarettes are easy to spot if you’re looking for them, not to mention the smoke remains on your clothes for quite some time. Also, you were far too eager to attack me and gave yourself away.”
When Jimmy finally stood up, I could see that his jaw, still barely growing stubble, was set and his eyes shown from the moisture there.
“I tell you this as your mentor. If you want to continue on this path, you have to leave behind your old habits and your need for praise. Listen to what I have to tell you, do everything I say, and, if you stay alive, you’ll be a weapon no man can beat.”
Greg - opera? Hah, that puts a whole different spin on what had been playing in my head!
Ah, nothing quite like passing on bad habits to the next generation... You've left me feeling bad for the poor driving instructor. I'd suggest simply failing Danny, but then he'd be unlikely to walk the streets safely ever again!
Ivy - I like that your take on the prompt is so nicely captured in your final paragraph. It's an interpretation I wasn't expecting, given the setting. Nicely done!
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