Tag Archives: lyrics

Carnival

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“Well, I’ve walked these streets
A virtual stage, it seemed to me
Makeup on their faces
Actors took their places next to me

Well, I’ve walked these streets
In a carnival, of sights to see
All the cheap thrill seekers vendors and the dealers
They crowded around me

Have I been blind have I been lost
Inside myself and my own mind
Hypnotized, mesmerized by what my eyes have seen?

Well, I’ve walked these streets
In a spectacle of wealth and poverty
In the diamond markets the scarlet welcome carpet
That they just rolled out for me

And I’ve walked these streets
In the madhouse asylum they can be
Where a wild-eyed misfit prophet
On a traffic island stopped and he raved of saving me

Have I been blind, have I been lost
Have I been wrong
Have I been wise
Have I been strong
Inside myself and my own mind…?”

‘Carnival’ – Natalie Merchant

Songwriters: Peter Anders Svensson / Magnus Sveningsson / Nina Persson

Carnival lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group, Downtown Music Publishing

While you were sleeping..

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‘While you were sleeping you tossed you turned
You rolled your eyes as the world burned

The heavens fell the earth quaked

I thought you must be but you weren’t awake, no

You were dreaming you ignored the sun

You grew your power garden for your little ones

And you found brides for them on Christmas Eve

They hung young Cain from the Adam trees

And danced uh oh

While you were sleeping I tossed and I turned too

I closed my eyes but the future burned through

The planet turned a hair grey as I relived the day…

I’ll never catch up to you who sleep so sound

My yawns are useless my heart beats too loud

To go to sleep my mind’s too proud to bow out.’

Lyrics by Elvis Perkins

Used to be

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Used to be that

Every time I saw you

I walked away and cried

From the tone in your voice

The way you raised your eye

The whisper on your breath

You thought you could deny

Used to be that

Every time I saw you

I caught you in a lie

hints and blunt suggestion

Words like bricks would fly

But now i never cry

Since i stood my ground

And took my aim

And drew pistols at fifty paces

And shot the crooked lie

Here I’ve hung it out to dry.

Street angels

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Like a bolt out of the blue they came to me
Standing in wait as I walked aimlessly
In the dark, the day, back street, bar pew
The night market, car park, the mall

Just standing around head looking down
Saying words under their breath
The names have escaped, their faces erased
But if not for intervention it was surely death

For just the week before or the night after last
Another girl just like me had also walked past
But they met a different face and ever since had paid
Ultimate price for freedom to walk out past late

Fellow from far North under dim street light
Walkabout round nowhere I’d been serving tables
Waiting just to take me in and serve me soy tea
He showed me what it meant to set my Spirit free

The woman waiting patiently each day on every street
For the one to hear her words and in turn agree
She gave up all she had also her family
To bare her soul to every passer by she’d meet

Once I knew the code of this secret army
I found them plain clothes everywhere
Staring right into my soul carefree
Just when nobody else would dare

Rewind

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I caught myself
On a cold wet night
Mesmerised by
That same sight
On the winding lane
I laid eyes on
the lighted way
That holds my own
Heart’s recipe
It makes me see in
Rear view clearly
When I could be
What I dared to be
I’d speak out loud
When I want to speak
Do whatever I cared to
I’d feel much more than
I ought to feel
Because there’s none
But you
The night sky is dark and heavy

Like my love

 

a nod at James Shelton’s famous song Lilac Wine (1950)