EX FILES
                                                                              Alan Berger

                                                                             I got a cat that’s dead
                                                                             I got a girlfriend instead
                                                                             Now I got a lumpier bed  

                                                                             An abundant woman
                                                                             Short of brains and bread

                                                                            She had a song inside her
                                                                            No one could play  
                                                                            She had a dragon inside her                          
                                                                            No one could slay
                                                                            If the games you played with her              
                                                                            Did not not go her way    
                                                                            She would pick up her marbles  
                                                                            And call it a day    

                                                                            The bills she sent me I would gladly pay
                                                                            After the tearful thanks
                                                                            I still could not get her to stay
                                                                            Sometimes you’re happy just to get what you can
                                                                            As I realized with her you’re in a foreign land   
                                                                            Bereft of a passport 
                                                                            In either hand


                                                                            She thinks she’s a fox   


                                                                            Instead of the toilet
                                                                            She uses a litter box

                                                                             When she gets sick
                                                                             I take her to the Vet   
                                                                             Every other day
                                                                             She throws away her cigarettes

                                                                              I appreciate the effort
                                                                              That she tries to replace my pet  
                                                                               Her being a human
                                                                               Is my only regret

                                                                               I already know
                                                                               I never go with the flow     
                                                                               A drastic situation with nowhere to go  

                                                                               In my head town
                                                                               All roads lead down   

                                                                               All my aims 
                                                                               Turn into reservations  
                                                                               All the motions That I file
                                                                               Become hesitations at the bottom of the pile       


                                                                                Standing on the corner
                                                                                Ringing a bell
                                                                                The gutters and the sewers know me too well
                                                                                Ringing that bell till end of my time
                                                                                My love and charm turn on a dime

                                                                                Did you know I never reap what I sew?
                                                                                I thought so       

                                                                                Letting it out
                                                                                When receiving the word
                                                                                Sounds like the confessions
                                                                                Of a Cuckoo bird
                                                                                Steady as a weathervane  
                                                                                Forthright and uptight
                                                                                In the wind and rain

                                                                                 It was a dark and stormy night   
                                                                                 Letting it known
                                                                                 Wherever I am blown
                                                                                 I inhabit a dead zone     

                                                                                  Have you ever had
                                                                                  An original thought?
                                                                                  Maybe a bright idea
                                                                                  And I mean something anything well lit  
                                                                                  And if so
                                                                                  What did ye do with it?


                                                                                      Been in a million hard fistfights 
                                                                                      All of them in my soft head
                                                                                      Not a lover nor a fighter
                                                                                      That’s what she said

                                                                                      May take on an imaginary friend                                                                                                   
                                                                                      One that would surely make me sing  
                                                                                      But the memory of the past
                                                                                      Is usually better than the present real thing  

                                                                                      But then again and again
                                                                                       Here is the thing
                                                                                      Who ever knows?
                                                                                      What the future  may bring

                                                                                      So stay far way, close, loose, and tight
                                                                                      Anything is possible   
                                                                                      Anything can take flight  

                                                                                      Rock with the punches 
                                                                                      Roll with the knocks  
                                                                                      Where the fuck, did I put that litter box?

Alan Berger’s bio and picture copy from one of the older issues (Thanks)