Music
In 2025, Mark Anthony Burke began releasing his newest collection of songs. The vocals on these and his earlier songs have been called “deep and wonderful” and “a rich amazing voice” by listeners, music critics and curators in the Americas and in Europe. Critics and listeners have described the songs and music as like “watching a movie”, “beautiful”, “transports me to another world”, that the songs have “great visuals, rich narratives” and “stunning lyrics”
Have a listen
THE WAY YOU BRING THE LIGHT
The long shadows begin to braid into dark and I walk
down to put the lambs away, I lay in the field and
wait for you to come down into the grass.
How I want you, the press of your hands the storm
in your eyes, the way your hair spills on my face, the
way you bring the light and take the world away.
I’ll watch for the first star, listen for your steps when
you walk thru the last flakes of light and the wind sings
in the trees about the days when we were still a dream.
I’ll lay out here and sail the stars fall into
the arms of your voice when you call to me.
How I want you, the press of your hands the storm
in your eyes, the way your hair spills on my face, the way
you bring the light and take the world away.
Listen to the Full Version
Promise to Be Brave
Teach me your short words again
those nights we did the tender sin
shared the ice and roses time
sang the songs hands play on skin
Call to me so I can find you
I’ve been lost and turned away from the moon
But I promise to be as brave as you
I’ve been lost and turned away from the moon
But I promise to be as brave as you
Bless me slowly with your hands
open my sad old heart
I want to do with you what
the moon does with the night
I see the chances that remain
this man can learn to love again
my beggar’s heart tied to yours
for whatever the fates may bring
Call to me so I can find you
I’ve been lost and turned away from the moon
But I promise to be as brave as you
I’ve been lost and turned away from the moon
But I promise to be as brave as you.
Listen to the Full Version
Never Let You Down
Pearly camped on her bus bench, grocery cart full of rags, spends her nights
under the James St. ramp hiding from the rain, can’t go back to the shelter,
lost her place in line, forgotten when her birthday is, only speaks in rhyme.
Pearly, Grace or Ruth, you could’ve been my mother,
another star-crossed time I would’ve been some other
boy and I’d never let you down, never let you down,
I’d never let you down, never let you down.
Ruth slipped deep in the dark when her Frankie died, talks like he’s
still with her lost somewhere deep inside, years go drifting past, piling up
like snow, can’t tell one from the other, when she’s got no place to go.
Grace laid behind the dumpster of an all-night taco stand wondering where
her children were, if Sam ever left Vietnam; eyes closed softly, hearing voices
from the past, humming songs of redemption, each night longer than the last.
Pearly, Grace or Ruth, you could’ve been my mother,
another star-crossed time I would’ve been some other
boy and I’d never let you down, never let you down,
I’d never let you down, never let you down.
Listen to the Full Version
SAY HELLO
I found an old strand of your hair and it
opened the tale we once told of our love.
There is no box to hold all the pictures,
the prairies we flew where the sky is god.
I miss your sky. Say hello for me.
Does the flicker still come and tap on your roof
the way he’d do when we’d lay on your bed
as the sun shone through the skylight
painting our bodies with the light and his shadow.
I miss your shadow. Say hello for me.
Like an emerald in my pocket, I carry the day
we rolled the grasses flat
when you called me to you
In a whisper I ached to obey.
The grocery bag was too small
for your bathrobe and slippers,
the grassland of our years.
Where did you put our river,
the field where we saw a fox race the wind?
I miss your fields. Say hello for me.
Listen to the Full Version
Three Tiny Cowboys
Petunia and a marigold made a little sailboat
Sailed upon the seven seas and pulled the plug.
Hunky punky ran around, feeling like and angry clown
Frowned so hard he couldn’t see, but let him be.
Three tiny cowboys, playing hockey shootin’ time
Eatin’ muffins and cabbage ‘til the sandman comes
What is it that happens when you have to grow up
When the burdens and the fear make the world close in
Don’t you think that I would sell my soul if I could
Help you grow without the wounds that make you bitter.
I can see you jumpin’ up, laughing eyes with a racing heart
I’ll grow along with you so I can touch your magic.
Three tiny cowboys, playing hockey shootin’ time
Eatin’ muffins and cabbage ‘til the sandman comes
Listen to the Full Version
BAG of STARS
Song lyrics
She knows when I don’t meet her eyes, I’ve told myself the old catastrophe she knows we should swear our treaty again leave each other notes, the ones we’d always send.
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But when her voice shines the morning, and the wind strums old songs through the leaves, she spins a heaven of our own and I go to her, open our bag of stars.
She knows before we cross into dreams, what I should conjure when the night begins,when the sand of days divides our sea can’t find her hand when I reach across for her.
She says if you’ve loved you’ve lost, have to learn how to forgive, find a drawer where you can lock it away.
But when her voice shines the morning, and the wind strums old songs through the leaves, she spins a heaven of our own and I go to her, open our bag of stars.
COME WITH ME WALKING
Song lyrics
We’d walk the mountain, play hide and seek I’d look for your shadow where you’d peek behind a wall of stones and I’d wait until the birds gave you away.
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I try not to lie to myself deep in the early morning dark, remembering how you’d talk to me when we still braided our lives.
Walk with me, find the way back when the days were clearer, when I wasn’t afraid, I can hear the voices, the ashes of the days, sweet love we used to know Can I be forgiven? Come with me walking, come with me walking, come with me walking.
I’ll wait for you up here in the clouds, when the time comes and the old horn sounds across the sky from two stars away and I need your sweet company.
MARK ANTHONY BURKE’S MUSIC CAN BE FOUND ON ALL MAJOR MUSIC SITES AND SERVICES
Video clips
Here are some of the over 20 music-lyric videos from the Mark Anthony Burke YouTube channel. Have a listen and enjoy the song lyrics that have been described as “beautiful”, “great story telling” and “captivating”.