"Trailer on the Moon" is from my 2011 album Broken Bird. A "broken-hearted vision of Las Vegas, achieved while scuba diving on acid," Broken Bird was originally conceived as a spoken word album, thus the title, which rhymes with "spoken word." It had other ideas for itself, however, and morphed into an album about being a broken bird.
"Trailer on the Moon" describes the descent into the neon Atlantis by a jaded protagonist who has relocated to a trailer park on the moon in search of peace. No it doesn't. "Trailer on the Moon" is obviously about being mired in love, that cursed, smoking tenement of desire in which the hearts of many broken birds reside. If the bird survives the collapse of the cheap, poorly-constructed sentiments that comprise the walls of the prison of suckers known as "love," he or she is then free to relocate to a more peaceful, lunar atmosphere. It is not necessary to be in complete possession of one's emotional faculties on arrival to the moon. The trailer park is clean and quiet, and none of the other residents will judge you if you engage in bouts of violent, ecstatic weeping, or furious joy from time to time. Indeed, all of us have been there. Once the rubble has settled, and the shrapnel of dramatic noise has been removed from the soul, the broken bird indeed can heal, and find peace. I don't drink, but my neighbor has been known to flick bottlecaps toward earth while sitting on the lawn chair in front of his RV. It takes about 4 years for the bottlecaps to make it back to earth, at which point they dissolve into constellations, meteors, and fireflies. Next time you see a firefly, look up at the moon from whence it came. Someone there is thinking about something else, and paying no attention whatsoever to the goings-on in the dismal, neon Atlantis on the surface of the ocean of quicksand upon which the entire world has been built. Sinking into the abyss, like an outhouse in the mud. All of it.
If you're over it, feel free to join us on the moon. Admittedly, the lunar accent can be hard to understand at first. Its tone and timbre are mellow, and don't lend themselves to presumptions of enlightening the world with trite observations that burden the listener with bags of boiling, verbal sand. There's no need to discard the thoughts of your neighbor like grenades that have been thrown over your fence, words and hateful indictments of your character which will explode at any moment. Those people don't exist. Every time they try to invade, we sweep them into outer space with a dustbroom. They go floating into the stars where they flail around like pieces of dying laundry, desperately trying to hook their hoses back up to the tanks of covetousness and loathing they invariably bring with them in the absurd, apparently-ubiquitous belief that they will need to want things that they hate, in order to survive.
They think they need it.
The lunar accent, though, is the sound of singing fireflies. Once you understand it, you will never be able to return to earth without experiencing boredom sickness. You need to take your boredom pills before you return to the surface of the abyss for any reason. Any return trip into the stupid, seething nightmare of course is ill-advised, but there are precautions one can take, if necessary.
Of course, it's better to avoid it.
If you can.
Trailer on the Moon
If you wanna leave me
why don't you start
by leaving me alone?
I know you don't believe me,
but baby,
I ain't coming home
You really must be happy
judging by all your tears of joy
and I'd ask you to come over
but there's nothing left to destroy
And anyway, what's the point?
Your silly little secret
is safe with me
Like a burning match
that blames the house for catching fire
we revel in the wreckage
of our so-called evil desires
You underestimate me
but that just gives me the upper hand
you try to recreate me
instead of taking me as I am
and not that you'd give a damn
but you're taking a chance baby
messin' with me
You can have everything
your worthless heart desires
baby, I'm tired
of all this God-forsaken fun
Close the curtain
put your jealous bones to rest
we'll never know for certain
whose turn it is to fail the test
You wanna talk to someone
well the cops will be here soon
and if you wanna find me
I'll be living in a trailer on the moon
baby,
I'll be seein' you soon
and by soon I mean never again!
Trailer on the moon
sleepin' late every afternoon
you're like a snowstorm in June
spit out your silver spoon
don't choke on your balloon
baby I'll be seein' you soon
and by soon
I mean never again!
And you can have everything
your worthless heart desires
baby, I'm tired
of all this God-forsaken fun
©2002 Nathan Payne
