The bittersweet hyper articulation of this track is a confluence of it’s melody and meaning. But not only the melody, some sweetness is derived from the clarity, it’s own kind of joy.
Ghosts are just old houses dreaming people in the night / Have no doubt about it, hon’, the dead will do alright / Go contemplate the evidence, I guarantee you’ll find / the dead know what they’re doing when they leave this world behind
From David Berman’s Actual Air:
From Cantos for James Michener: Part II
CI.
The jets move slowly through the sky like they’ll never
reach Denver or wherever they’re going,
and I have the feeling that people are high-fiving nearby,
spontaneously, like a saloon brawl where everyone
suddenly starts fighting as if each man has
a preconscious knowledge of which side he’s on
when he enters a crowded room.
And this fight starts with a Polish joke that a man
at the bar begins to tell, but it’s not funny
as it concerns a stillborn child and an alcoholic
slain by the last European wolf, and even after
three hours there is no punchline in sight.
When he reaches the part where a Polish scientist
who has been navigating through millimeters of wilderness
discovers sub-atomic temples in a rust sample,
none of the men are listening,
they are thinking about their own childhoods
about the deep embarrassment of scoring on your own team
and the view from falling behind.
Plainly & Painfully 