Laurence Overmire - Odyssey lyrics

Thirty years is a long time Thirty years... These streets were mine thirty years ago I knew them all Every turn, every alley A young boy's kingdom I ruled and was king Thirty years ago... The leaves still fall here Confettied remains of a bygone parade The school is still standing Dirty brown brick, it still hasn't changed The playground is haunted By the laughing cries of children Swing creaking slowly in the cool autumn wind Do I sit there boy-like Smiling at the man Thirty years older Thirty years gone by? The ball diamond is empty The dirt hasn't changed Chain fences still linked Where the spectators gazed The dreams were alive then Like Mantle and Mays And life was as easy as a bat and a ball Three strikes you're out It's the umpire's call But thirty years pa**es Like the flick of a wrist And the diamond is empty— Save for me and the dirt. Thirty years ago I walked this road Two, three times a day From home to school and back again And every house is where it was And every tree seems just the same And there on the corner: 10704 (I'd forgotten that address—thirty years is a long time...) They painted it a god-awful yellow But it's still the same We were a family then My brother, sister, parents and I The times were hard in ‘68 Hell, King was k**ed Detroit was aflame But we were safe Some lived in fear We had each other, did we know it then? Thirty years is a long time. The second floor there In the back My brother and I shared bunk beds And I cried for hours Alone on that bed When they gave my dog away The best friend I had How could they know? I hear him bark Tethered by a chain to the old birch tree A country dog, he needed to run The city's no place for a wilderness heart Thirty years And I still hear him Barking. There's the garage in the back of the yard It was rickety then, it's rickety now And there are the holes That held a basketball rim We spent hours there My brother and I Perfecting our jumpers, hook shots, and drives Pretending to be the great gamers themselves But we were impostors And I suppose we still are Perhaps thirty years Is not so long After all. As I drive away A man, not a boy I pa** the old playground See a man and his son The man's about my age The boy—as I was And it seems strange to think That this father and I Might have been cla**mates Thirty years ago Yet he has gone his way And I have gone mine And thirty years hence that boy will be me And return to this playground Look back on his life His life but a memory A dream, nothing more Conceived in sweet sadness With a flicker of hope But destined at last To vanish Like smoke. Goodbye to my childhood Goodbye to these streets Goodbye to the children who laughed here with me My dog who still barks at the end of a chain My parents much younger My brother and me And goodbye to the lad who stands at the plate On a dusty old diamond The bat high in his hands Still waiting for a pitch That never gets thrown.