To me, an excellent concert is something akin to a religious experience. Performers upon a brightly-lit stage, smoke coiling heavenward. Voice channelling power livewire, a feral growl harnessed in porcelain words.

I saw David Gray last night. I sat in the fifth row, slightly right of center. Mike took me because he'd never come to town in our time.

The concert was everything I could have possibly hoped for and things that I thought I had forgotten. Things that I buried and locked away. I remembered a person that I haven't been in a long time. That hopeful person. Feel it now, he sang. And I did.

For starters, Life in Slow Motion is brilliant. Really, it is. But onstage, it was better. It was lush. It was charged. He played almost every song from that disc. "Disappearing World" was unspeakably beautiful live.

We’re threading hope like fire
Down through the desperate blood
Down through the trailing wire
Into the leafless wood
Poetry in motion. He played many songs that are special to me-- the crowd went wild when he began "The One I Love".

Gonna close my eyes girl
and watch you go
Tell the repo man
And the stars above
You’re the one I love
His words cut me and move me like no one else. They've always been exactly what I'd meant to say, but my tongue could never be so eloquent, so true.

Many of the songs were old favorites from White Ladder. That disc is so very personal to me-- I loved it first when my world was opening, blooming. When I was so in love that I couldn't feel anything but the burning of my own skin, the arrow in my chest.

Please forgive me
If I act a little strange
For I know not what I do--
Feels like lightning running through my veins
Everytime I look at you
Because isn't that what love is? I'm not talking about the kind of comfortable love that you settle into, that blooms slowly. I mean the kind of love that hits you, knocks you down, takes you to depths so deep that you can't breathe. No air. It's a lightning strike. I can say for truth that I have loved more deeply, more intensely than most people could ever hope to love. It is a gift, precious and undeserved. And at times, it hurts more than I can stand, more than I can convey with my dry tongue. It chokes me at times. Small noises in the back of my throat. No words could ever be sufficient. But David Gray gets it. He takes all of the broken beauty and offers it up as art-- as flesh made word, made song.

I won't pretend that I didn't burst into tears of joy and sorrow as he began the opening chords of "Please Forgive Me". I also cried during "This Year's Love," played as an encore. That song means so much to me. It was a song of firsts. It so closely encapsulated every gift I wanted to give. It was so prophetic. Still is. I sang, I let the tears slip down my face. I was there, present. Nowhere else under the stars that I would rather be.

So many words about the disintigration of that joy, that love. So many words about mistakes I've made, silver weighed under a red moon. The slow sinking of reality and timing and circumstance. The breathlessness that comes when your lungs fill with saline. The cup tipped over at your feet. It takes so much to keep your heart from freezing.

Drag a salted kiss
From this cup of bliss
Watch a new lie twist on the breeze

Honey lately I've been way down
Someone tell me where did it go
Darling, I'm damned if I know
I seen that look in your eye
No one ever gave it a chance
I could have said in advance
You saw it all at a glance
Goodbye
Goodbye

(But we'll meet where the flame turns blue. And in the morning, I will sing.)

And that's the way it is. A road strewn with goodbyes. This is the way the world ends-- not with a bang, but a whimper. But he added something to the song. Something not in the recording. A cledon, a sign. So much of my life is full circles and signs.

I will find my place
I will find my place
Emphatically. And I will.

Tell the man to fill my cup
Honey I ain't gonna stop
Little darling...
Well, the rest is plain.

And it was strange. I woke up this morning-- late-- I'd forgotten to set my alarm. I turned on the radio. Dave Matthews was singing to me.

The space between your heart and mind is the space we fill with time
Thanks, Dave. I needed that.

Whole and ready. I will find my place.

You’re in my mind baby
Now and always
Ill wind that blows in
From all directions
You’re in my mind baby
Now and always