Something Tamed Something Wild - Mary Chapin Carpenter

Here’s a shoebox full of letters bound up neatly with some twine

Each one was like a diamond, now the jewel is lost to time

My reward is in the knowing that I held it in my hands for a little while

What else are there but the treasures in your heart?

Something tamed, something wild

For every time that I’ve been foolish when I’d wished that I’d been wise

The power of regret still gets me right between the eyes

And sometimes I want to weep with nothing but the tears of a little child

What else are there but the lessons in your heart?

Something tamed, something wild

Here’s a map I’ve memorized of everywhere I’ve ever been

And the faces of everyone I’ve loved and left to try again

I couldn’t make out what they were saying, so instead I listened hard to what’s

inside

What else is there but the voice inside your heart?

Something tamed, something wild

Some nights I’m woken up by something stirring in my chest

It’s a feeling I’ve no name for, it’s hard to catch my breath

I’m staring down the great big lonesome as I’m listening for the dwindling of

time

What else are there but the echoes in your heart?

Something tamed, something wild

So the things that matter to me now are different from the past

I care less about arriving than just being in the path

Of some light carved out of nothing, the way it feels when the universe has

smiled

What else is there but the beating of your heart?

Something tamed, something wild

Here’s the shoebox full of letters, here’s the map I won’t forget

The voices and the lessons and the signals that connect us

Manifested to the spirit, way deep down where it goes unseen by the eye

What else is there but the love inside your heart?

To a life like a firework’s to a spark

Over and above you in its arc

Something tamed, something wild