Everything I Touched Caught Fire Lyrics

The tender breathing belly of an orange under-cloud
the scrutiny of a streetlamp over me
Drew a breath of smoke from the heavy autumn air
just outside the courthouse finally free
Pawned a driftwood clarinet and a silver chain I had
bought a greyhound ticket heading west
Underneath the blanket of a lost and found box jacket
My head against the window trying to rest

Gonna scar my face
in a different place
or maybe wear my hat down low
Pull a stick-up job
on some five and dime
Keep slithering town to town

I shuffled along the shoulder of an unmarked road
stopped to catch my breath outside Des Plaines
slipped into a Laundromat to grab some baggy clothes
then slept out on the ashtray by the lake
The very next evening in some half-deserted bar
some black-eyed Molly bought me watered drinks
a couple hours later, swapped stories in her kitchen
while waiting for leftovers to reheat

Gonna change my ways
Try and be some place
Gonna fight the urge to go
Find an honest job
at some nine to five
and maybe stick around

Early the next morning,
she called a friend of her late husband's
a foreman at a plastics factory
Got me some shit job for under the table cash
just until I got back on my feet
I could picture Molly through two black eyes crying
even though I hadn't wronged her yet
Every time I'd ever managed landing on my feet
I'd be looking for a cozy place to sit

Cut my fingers trimming flash, burned both of my hands
the foreman came to ride me about the rate
The hopper wound up jammed.
I over-filled the press.
The foreman sent me home for the day
I couldn't face Molly, so I walked around for hours
before I started fixing to leave
a day or two later, I read in some paper
about a fire at that factory

Gonna scar my face
in a different place
or maybe wear my hat down low
Pull a stick-up job
on some five and dime
Keep slithering town to town