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Do Not Forsake Me: Selections From 2008​-​2013

by Anthony Jay Sanders

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    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

    If you pay for a download of this album, your download will automatically come with a 27-page digital set of liner notes, handwritten/digital lyrics, and drawings made during the period these songs were written in. They were compiled by me, and graciously formatted by James Cassar of Near Mint Records.
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1.
Leagues 04:04
I've tried my best to explain you to the present cast of characters that jumped into your clothes. I drag the past into the present, fossilized relevant sentiment all sewn into your robes. You're in my closet, in my drawers and in my pockets. You're written in my records and my books. You were my conscience, wade the waters of my Loch Ness. You stay under with the baby that you shook. I'm not the bestest with attendance; I get nested and I stay home. I write myself out of your history; I wonder if you ever miss me. I won't know. But where can you be? I get antsy waiting. Don't go, no matter how hard your heart or depleted your soul. Because I'm not worth half of what I sing if you're not beside me and inside me, inspiring everything. I was Peter, he was Paul. You're at the center of it all. You wore all black and your dad's hat instead of rags. We chatted up with the homeless while our parents never noticed that we traded every hour that we had. I told my dad through choking screaming tearing breaths that I loved you more than I loved anything. I see the hole inside my church, I see the whole of what you're worth, and you had filled that opening. You stabbed the blow-up Christmas snow globe, and you cried because you had to. I brought a shoulder and a friendship that grew older because it had to. But where can you be? I get antsy waiting. Don't go, no matter how hard your heart or depleted your soul. Because I'm not worth half of what I sing if you're not beside me and inside me, inspiring everything. Arlene! Alicia! Is this what you promised? Is this what you salvaged? Leagues and leagues beneath me now?
2.
Crown 03:36
We haven't talked in months; it's time I speak I've led a little lifetime in 20 weeks It had a very small midlife crisis too, and on that dark dark day, I thought of you I'm stable now, from bike to trike and I date a short girl that I really like She's olive-skinned and smiles so much and buckles under thumb like living plush And I cry in the bathroom a lot and this is barely even a song; it's just some silence that I break I wanna hold your crown so heavy in the sky and sing, "You're my favorite guy tonight" I'll hit you with my endless supply of sighs But I hold her to my breast, say "You're the girl that I love best” It's true; she may be my girl, but she's not you It's not sexual, it's something else It's a willingness to turn into my lapdog self and a willingness to cancel plans and pledge to you on two right hands It's my dirty feet, so brash and bare when I walk your block, and you don't know I'm there and the trees bow down to every house so thick with futures unannounced It's a rendezvous between divorcees so sick of every three word phrase They sit and stare over empty plates then one of them swallows and says, "You look great" Then smiles crack open, and knowing looks unravel like in romance books and I just can't keep my stupid face from cracking open like your mom's vase And it hurts, and it's hard to explain and I'm sorry that I brought it up it's just hard not to sing
3.
Don’t fall far, deep, hard Don’t fall far, deep, hard Don’t fall far (I love you), deep, hard Don’t fall far (I love you), deep, hard Won’t all scars seep dark from the far, black stars that I chart, those sleek shards that you sparked into are? I am tar, car parts that won’t start, farce art. There are still from all the videos of everything you’ve uglied up for both of us; the ghost of us is thickening the walls around my heart. Circle into smaller holes. I keep imagining an epitaph, in a timeline undefined: "Beloved Father, Purified Water" Watch me walk on my left hand. I want to tell you I'm feeling better, and I will, and I'll tell you I do. But I'm sick. I've been feeling sick, and little things I own start crying because they're mine.
4.
We roll out of the fire We roll into the grass, in what looks like the 50s Your stare is alive and it's living in mine, now you're crying with me I'm spilling it all I know that you know, you've stared off my veiling I'm visible now You're weeping in crowds, and we're thinking the same thing We were wrong, in the palm of a fault I love you, and I'm sorry is all and I can't tell a story without making mistakes and leaving out the good days I pull you on foot We both look around, and the scenery switches Surprise is a friend There's black and there's white, a preacher betwixt this A wedding as waves We're swept up and dazed, but as we get calmer, it eases the tide The people subside, and we lay on the altar You fold in my chest My errors are a red fern grown I don't want the future; I just want you, and you alone Don't fall far deep hard
5.
Buried 03:01
Fond but not in love, like wet to waterbug Love but not ensconced, I'm fond of confidante I'm sitting in a fire in the center of a 7-10 split I am hit but it is nothing this is nothing I am fine leave me alone Killed while sitting still, I have abandoned me Still love being killed, I think of her fondly Room looks like my colon and my eyes, red and puffy, roll around They catch nothing this is nothing this is dead dead, suppressed I have killed it I thought I buried you But here you come, gallivanting from the grave You smell like formaldehyde You kiss me as if I wasn't shivering You kick your dirt around You hold your stomach, luminescent bloody discharge Pouring like a baking soda story and I wake up thinking you missed me Fond but not in love, I know I buried you Fond but not in love, your ribs are showing now Fond but not in love I can't tell anyone
6.
I'm a set of stripped screws torn from a stage-play set. And though admitting it's a noose, I do not fully get it yet. Bed's breathing like a sponge, squeezing water from its chest. And though I have a hunch, I do not fully get it yet. I'm a lifestyle choice... ...not quite the schwa de vivre. Is that the secret source of noise, like a mouse i thought I saw? Play "Find the Disembodied Voice." I used to always play to win. If it's not in my crate of toys, then I don't know where to begin. I grab the edges of the jagged cliffs of friendship. I dream in vivid tension, and I always fail to mention in the morning when scratch and yawn, repeat, almost deliberately, to distract me. I'm seated at the demand of Our Father at the right hand of a toddler; he's a never-ending sobber, and I hate seeing my face and seeing his, and that's the way this evening is. How can I help it? And you talk it to death. I'm naked like an emperor, and I'm prodded to breath. What to utter's my concern. The circles start to settle in; they've come to make my butter churn. I've got options, I suppose. I could make a clean escape. I can walk longer than most, maybe return to ticker tape. I'm an asshole and I gape. It's easy to lead little boys to prison, lock 'em in and never miss 'em. If you wanna make a mockery of heart, then that's a proper way to start. But if I manage to do just as much damage just by being me, who would ever wanna stick their head out mama's sauna to emerge into a world of tangled cables and small towns that aren't stable? I'd love to say I know myself, but I keep trying to hide my purse from me! And you talk it to death. I'm naked like an emperor, and I'm prodded to breath.
7.
Show of hands: Would anybody here like to watch movies and eat delivered food? Wear comfy clothes and tell personal truths? Show of hands to an empty room. I suck my thumb and sing: "What did I do?" Show of hands: Would anybody here like me as something more than merely friendly if you'd just met me these past 4 weeks? You don't have to sugar coat it nicely, because that's a form of lying to me. A thousand miles of thought just for her. I'm crying in a cup about why I left home. A thousand miles a minute just for her. She's crying in a plate about her ex-brother. A thousand miles in a circling car. This conversation's looped 4 bars. A thousand miles of speech; he listened selflessly to me, his enemy. Show of hands: Would anybody respect me if they only knew how I abandoned Audrey? If they only knew how I hurt...her. I was going to rhyme, but I cannot sing her name. Our past is the problem, and I'm the one to blame. Or maybe she's over it, and I'm a loser. Maybe, I could learn to socialize without having to draw anonymous eyes, thinking I am funny all the time. Maybe dilated eyes can finally help me be the boy I was born to be plunged into a world of maturity, where I've grown, and these clothes no longer fit me. With memories as mammaries poking... you thought that I was joking! The content never shimmered right. I could write and record, but I'd be up all night.
8.
Brains 04:18
He who thinks one can lie with words might think that it was happening here Touch my brain Glass-contained Trace its rivets and ridges Find where you are Pry inside Find where she hides The girl on a jutting piece of land, arching over the cliff Like a diving board She’s swallowing lightning My point-of-view’s spinning I’m knelt on the grass Sun stays overcast She pulls me with little-to-no effort like a feather on a Pegasus’s wing And flies me off I’m gripping on something The wind is all whipping Details are impossible Land with no understanding I keep having the same strange dream where the presence that drives me to write flies with me. I want you to touch my brain and finally see what I mean, so I feel sane. But instead, you just ask “What’s up?”, and I say nothing. I don't say nothing.
9.
Three Dreams 08:08
I had to leave because everyone looked like you Should that not affect me? I just had to go when they all started quoting you Should that not upset me? In the door you stood, wrapped in your favorite dress You love your own slinky frame, and the halo above your head Am I to blame for this funeral setting? Only in dreams do I have trouble forgetting On a white bed with lily white sheets we reintroduced ourselves You seemed fine and didn't seem to mind my fountains for eyes When I woke up, I called you crying You're one of my closest friends, I've accepted that with time I hope you're not stained by the results of this bloodletting Only in dreams to I have trouble forgetting I pinned you down seedy and unromantic in my filthy bedroom Little did I know there were 3rd person photographs an invisible camera man The pictures lined the walls of the apartment that I live in They decorate the halls, making me livid I said, “I hate your finishing face, I told you I didn't like it” Only in dreams, I somehow always manage to find it Are my thoughts in the wrong place? You can be honest You don't ever have to lie to make me happy No, you don't I'll sulk anyway and let these dreams seep into my days I'll sulk anyway and let these bad dreams seep into my days I'll sulk anyway
10.
Zero to sixty, you lift me up so high Make me feel like I have been in love a couple hundred times Buoyant and inspired I yell and scream for higher A sea of incredible hands under my back Tossed into the awesome of the options within black A sunflower so giant that gods as ants can't climb it I'm made pain-filled anxious, canker-ridden split-open cysts like white-yellow war wounds I'm spit from the brown inside to this pool of arsenic and then I wake up Why does each one of my dreams end in water? I don't want to think I'm cutting my own Island The boar is laughing in a smoke-filled clearing I run to make a cave where he once stood I keep pushing back the thick breeze Find me looking like I'm underwater
11.
I used to move with courage Now I break by dawn I had a migratory purpose Now I move like one impossible swan A bed like the back of a hearse is You wouldn't recognize the person I'm different all day I live inside of a terseness My heart just looks like pursed lips all heard opinions verdicts The ones I love know no one There's a man in my house He will stand in my doorway He's grinding his teeth He's breathing through me There's a man in my house He will say what he wants to say He lives on his knees Living means I live with me I used to know a tall tree By the top I'd lay A part of me left long ago, fell long ago and a little shred of me has always stayed There's a man in my house He will stand in my doorway He's grinding his teeth He's breathing through me There's a man in my house He will say what he wants to say He lives on his knees Living means I live with me
12.
Guest Room 05:25
I'm in the guest room I'm in her shirt that's 10 sizes too big for her I'm humming nocturnes Babble on about a heart that's 10 sizes too big for me too sound asleep While my head is a harbor for imagined endeavors too big for me too sound asleep “Good luck, tiger muffin” “Good night, kitten fingers” If I lose breath while duetting, sing on, my opera singer And if you really want me, I am 10 feet away this time I'm in the guest room It's storming outside Flood up her house and float her bed near mine And we'll look at each other and we'll laugh, she'll be pretty And we'll laugh while it's easy while no one's looking I'll dream it to life, if I sleep well tonight too big for me too sound asleep “Good luck, tiger muffin” “Good night, kitten fingers” If I lose breath while duetting, sing on, my opera singer And if you really want me, I am 10 feet away this time
13.
I had a tense phone call It was cold out, and I ran inside the phone was thawing from the sweat beading on my palms In the foyer, jostling knobs and pulling In the staircase, lying down I took off my coat, draped it on the rail There was a pool my tongue was lapping in the bottom of my mouth during a tense phone call I continued the call lying down on my staircase red carpet with dirt independently crawling the snow in my shoes was melting to accidentally clean My socks were blue and black with dress shoe residue Four small cylinders inside me were suddenly beside me I looked down at my still-beating heart in my lap and tried not to laugh into the receiver Sometimes the walls are white, sometimes they’re streaked black from rubs but right then, the walls were all a tense phone call I was restless from wrestling with space into a comfortable position on my staircase I couldn’t go inside for confidentiality My coat begrudged, my snow shoes trudged The wind was terse under and over my shoulders and between my legs in assonant pace Every “O” and “A” in the wind pounding out sound interrupting the streamlined swell of it all in the private Hell of my tense phone call I felt one pedal digit fidget from under me Left foot index toe twitching through a hole I felt it actively in a calloused walk From the 8th crack to the 2nd crack and back again from the heels that I can’t feel to blackened ends My socks depend on lighter steps and I can’t manage to smile in heavy stalks of ice that stayed and stalled on the hair on my face in this tense phone call I once cried in your lap I was telling secrets to it and produced my own embalming fluid Cropped past grimace in the stiff starch of his supposed ownership projected onto your white pelvic wall You brushed my hair with your hands and separated dreaming tracks in its sand I wouldn’t dream of ruining you because you were all I knew But you became tense lines later on that day in the year of our cordial departure the staircase are the bones in your ear the wind wraps around a misunderstanding I am an ape exercising restraint in fire half-hearted in menopausal theater There’s an attitude that’s being pressed into my socks from my shoes bruised in blue-black permanence There are faults of mine like cars stalled and the movement shows no improvement in this tense phone call There are poems I launch away there are songs that lay naked in my arms and there are people that learn to fly all by themselves and then there’s you and I don’t think I could ever feel comfortable with you again
14.
Hurts 02:15
They think I'm fast asleep I'm in my room and 10 feet deep I'm not okay and haven't been I'll just pace 'round the room again Sometimes my world hurts
15.
Don't cry, this is natural These are living rooms, these are your friends Don't cry, this is natural We may never know when this phase will end I just received an offer with a stipend and stress and I'm scared to death that I'll tell them “yes” I know that I'll complain of being held under duress but my draft is open, I'm typing “yes” I don't know why I always wink at harm I hold trouble in my big strange arms and tell it, “You'll be mine forever” I opted out of busing where I needed to go and I walked two hours in the polar cold I was offered to be driven, but I wasn't sold and I froze and froze in frigid folds I don't know why I let myself get hurt I hold a spoon up to my just desserts and tell them, “You'll be mine forever” Don't cry, this is natural These are living rooms, these are your friends Don't cry, this is natural We may never know when this phase will end I think I'll eat a messy mountain, and decide I will and I walk 2 miles, I go to Jeri's Grill I know I'll never be a dainty daffodil so I widen field-size at Jeri's Grill It feels ridiculous to know my faults and take them dancing in a doe-eyed waltz and whisper, “You'll be mine forever” I think about the girl that gives me prickled hairs I look across the booth, and she's very there I know she's not an angel and I barely care I will her where I will, and she's very there I think I'm terrified of knowing joy It's all disintegrants that I employ and tell them, “You'll work here forever” Don't cry, this natural These are living rooms, these are your friends Don't cry, this is natural We may never know when this phase will end We've just got to know that today will end

about

15 songs over 5 years. Many more exist, but I handpicked these to provide some context for my upcoming record.

If you pay for the album in any capacity, you'll receive SEVERAL pages of downloadable liner notes, pictures, and lyrics. Would love it if you did that.

credits

released April 27, 2016

Tracks 1-2
Recorded, mixed, mastered by Kurt Roy
Guest vocals by Chris Dertz, Julia Bard, Jack Greenleaf

Tracks 3-4
Recorded, mixed, mastered by Mike Crotty
Guest vocals by Kate Grube, Erik Czaja

Tracks 5-11
Recorded, mixed, mastered by Anthony Sanders
Guest vocals on track 10 by Clare Teelinng

Track 12
Recorded, mixed by Spiros Loukopoulos

Tracks 13-15
Recorded, mixed by Anthony Sanders
Mastered by Kurt Roy

Photograph by Ali Spray, Design by Corey Purvis
Near Mint 14
4/27/16

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Anthony Jay Sanders Chicago, Illinois

I sing for The Island of Misfit Toys, I sing for myself, and I definitely sing for you. This is a place to gradually release everything that isn't TIOMT.
For TIOMT music:
tiomt.bandcamp.com

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