Track Insight / Lyrics
October bends the sunlight low
One small stand beside the road
A lonely boy cups ice and tea
While waiting strangers pass by
His father's ladder rests in sight
Rust on every crosswise bar
He signs in chalk, "One glass, just right"
A kite can't fly beneath the scar
The afternoon turns copper-brown
A yellow kite is chopped and down
A silver car slows, gravel pops
The woman's scarf has foxed white
She asks the price before he stops
He says, "A quarter tastes like light"
Her gloved hand warms the folded note
Her engine purrs beside his boat
Oh, pour another little glass
October summer, pass me by
The boy pours sunshine, cool as brass
Two strangers wave as evening flies
Oh, drink the sweetness while it lasts
And hold the moment, him and I
A brass handle catches on the hinge
Three sugar cubes turn to snow
The woman listens to him sing
A hymn he learned at six, ago
The pump organ plays inside his head
A borrowed melody, half-fed
The last bright leaf is under glass
He swears he hears the old church bell
She smooths a crease from paper bands
A maple seed sticks to her heel
He fills the glass with careful hands
As copper dusk begins to steal
The stand is bare, the ice is small
A cricket starts beneath the wall
Oh, pour another little glass
October summer, pass me by
The boy pours sunshine, cool as brass
Two strangers wave as evening flies
Oh, drink the sweetness while it lasts
And hold the moment, him and I
Then she is gone, the street is gray
A single lemon, bright and small
He folds the sign and closes the stand
The wind can have the paper wall
But through the dark, it starts to chime
The quarter warms his pocket fine
The neighbor dog forgets his name
The mailbox glows behind the rain
He pockets what she spent on him
A tiny coin beside the linden
His father calls him from the lane
A supper bell begins to ring
The brown leaves skip across the drain
He carries summer from the stand
A bare branch taps the wooden frame
A jar of light beside the jam
He knows she carried some with her
Oh, pour another little glass
October summer, pass me by
The boy pours sunshine, cool as brass
Two strangers wave as evening flies
Oh, drink the sweetness while it lasts
And hold the moment, him and I
The street lamp clicks, the shutter seals
The quarter rests beneath his thumb
A childhood hymn of summer steals
Across the dusk, across the hum
And when the final light is gone
He keeps the sweetness, carries on