Her Majesty the Decemberists
Album - 9 september 2003 - Debaser id 99335

We set to sail on a packet full of spice, rum and tea-leaves.
We've emptied out all the bars and the bowery hotels.
Tell your daughters do not walk the streets alone tonight
Tell your daughters do not walk the streets alone tonight.

To tell the tale of the Jewess and the Mandarin Chinese boy
He led her down from her gilded canopy of cloth.
And through her blindfold she could make out the figures there before her
And how the air was thick with incense, cardamom and myrrh.

So goodnight, boys, goodnight
Say goodnight, boys, goodnight

We set to sail on the clipper that's bound for South Australia
The weather's warm there, the natives are dark and nubile.
But if you listen, quiet, you can hear the footsteps on the cross-trees
The ghosts of sailors passed, their spectral bodies clinging to the shrouds.

So goodnight, boys, goodnight
Say goodnight, boys, goodnight

Billy Liar's got his hands in his pockets
Staring over at the neighbor's, knickers down
He's got his knickers down

So the summer is eternity for you?
Sleeping in until your father's shaking you down
He's shaking you down

And the mail room shift gets a real short shrift
As you dole out the packages, no-one seems to want you around
All skulking around

Let your legs loll on the lino
Till your sinews spoil
Will you stay here, for awhile, dear
Till the radio plays something familiar?
Plays something familiar

All a-drifting, he's a no good boy-o
Sent a-fishing for a whalebone corset frame
His only catch all day

So he sits and lets the current take him
A gentle breeze will leave his pants in disarray
And at his ankles laid

As he drifts to sleep with a moan and a weep
He is decked by a Japanese geisha with a garland of pearls
How she twists and twirls!

Let your legs loll on the lino
Till your sinews spoil
Will you stay here, for awhile, dear
Till the radio plays something familiar?
Plays something familiar

Till the radio plays something familiar
Plays something familiar
Plays something familiar
Plays something familiar

There is a city by the sea
A gentle company
I don't suppose you want to
And as it tells its sorry tale
In harrowing detail
Its hollowness will haunt you

Its streets and boulevards
Orphans and oligarchs are here
A plaintive melody
Truncated symphony
An ocean's garbled vomit on the shore
Los Angeles, I'm yours

O ladies pleasant and demure
Sallow-cheeked and sure
I can see your undies
And all the boys you drag about
An empty fallow fount
From Saturdays to Mondays
You hill and valley crowd
Hanging your trousers down at heel
This is the realest thing
As ancient choirs sing
A dozen blushing cherubs wheel above
Los Angeles, my love

Oh what a rush of ripe élan
Languor on divans
Dalliant and dainty
But oh, the smell of burnt cocaine
The dolor and decay
It only makes me cranky

O great calamity
Ditch of iniquity and tears
How I abhor this place
Its sweet and bitter taste
Has left me wretched, retching on all fours
Los Angeles, I'm yours
Los Angeles, I'm yours
Los Angeles, I'm yours

There's a wrinkle in the water
Where we laid our first daughter
And I think the wind blows so sweetly there
Over there

And the windows and the cinders
And the willows in the timbers
The infernal rapping of the rain
Still remains

"But I," said the bachelor to the bride,
"Am not waiting for tonight
No, I, I will box your ears and leave you here stripped bare, stripped bare"

Hear the corncrakes, and the deer hooves
And the sleet rain on the slate roof
A medallion locked inside her hands
In her hands

And his fingers, are they telling
Of the barren of her belly?
Do his calluses cure her furrowed brow?
Even now?

"But I," said the bachelor to the bride,
"Am not waiting for tonight
No, I, I will box your ears and leave you here stripped bare"
Stripped bare, stripped bare, stripped bare

"But I," said the bachelor to the bride,
"Am not waiting for tonight
No, I, I will box your ears and take your tears and leave you
Leave you here, stripped bare"

Myla Goldberg sets a steady hand upon her brow
Myla Goldberg hangs a crooked foot all upside down
It comes around, it comes around, it comes around, it comes around
It comes around, it comes around, it comes around, it comes around

Pretty hands do pretty things when pretty times arise
Seraphim in seaweed swim where stick-limbed Myla lies
It comes around, it comes around, it comes around, it comes around
It comes around, it comes around, it comes around, it comes around

Still now you're waiting to grow
Inside you're old
Sew wings to your pigeon toes
Put paper to pen and spell out Eliza

We begin with sticky shins, make sticky then our shoes
Shoes beget to clothes and hat, till sticky's sticking too
Finiculi, finicula, finiculi, finicula
Finiculi, finicula, finiculi, finicula

Listen in as shin-kicked Jim relates his story sad
About a boy who kicked until his shins were all but rubber bands
But now, I know New York, I need New York, I know I need unique New York
I know New York, I need New York, I know I need unique New York

Still now you're waiting to grow
Inside you're old
Sew wings to your pigeon toes
Put paper to pen and spell out Eliza
Eliza
Eliza

It comes around, it comes around, it comes around

This is the story of your red right ankle
And how it came to meet your leg
And how the muscle, bone, and sinews tangled
And how the skin was softly shed

And how it whispered "Oh adhere to me
For we are bound by symmetry
And whatever differences our lives have been
We together make a limb."
This is the story of your red right ankle.

This is the story of your gypsy uncle
You never knew 'cause he was dead
And how his face was carved and rift with wrinkles
In the picture in your head.

And remember how you found the key
To his hideout in the Pyrenees
But you wanted to keep his secret safe
So you threw the key away.
This is the story of your gypsy uncle.

This is the story of the boys who loved you
Who love you now and loved you then
And some were sweet, and some were cold and snuffed you
And some just laid around in bed.

Some had crumbled you straight to your knees
Did it cruel, did it tenderly
Some had crawled their way into your heart
To rend your ventricles apart
This is the story of the boys who loved you
This is the story of your red right ankle.

I am a chimbley, a chimbley sweep
No bed to lie, no shoes to hold my feet
Upon the rooftop in dead of night
You'll hear me cry, I'll shake you from your sleep

To hear me weep
Your day will come indeed
For I am a poor and a wretched boy
A chimbley, chimbley sweep

I am an orphan, an orphan boy
I've known no love, I've seen no mother's joy
A dirty doorstep, my cradle lay
My fortune's made, I'll shake you from your sleep

To hear me weep
Your day will come indeed
For I am a poor and a wretched boy
A chimbley, chimbley sweep

"Oh, lonely urchin," the widow cried,
"I've not been swept since the day my husband died."
Her cheeks a-blushing, her legs lay bare
And shipwrecked there, I'll shake you from your sleep

To hear me weep
Your day will come indeed
For I am a poor and a wretched boy
A chimbley, chimbley sweep
For I am a poor and a wretched boy
A chimbley, chimbley sweep

I was meant for the stage
I was meant for the curtain
I was meant to tread these boards
Of this much I am certain

I was meant for the crowd
I was meant for the shouting
I was meant to raise these hands with quiet all about me
Oh, whoa...

Mother, please be proud
Father, be forgiving
Even though you told me, "Son, you'll never make a living"
Oh, whoa...

And from the floor boards to the flies
Here I was fated to reside
And as I take my final bow
Was there ever any doubt?

And as the spotlights fade away
And you're escorted through the foyer
You will resume your callow ways
But I was meant for the stage

The heavens at my birth
Intended me for stardom
Rays of light shone down on me
And all my sins were pardoned

I was meant for applause
I was meant for derision
Nothing short of fate itself has affected my decision
Oh, whoa...

From the floorboards to the flies
Here I was fated to reside
And as I take my final bow
Was there ever any doubt?

And as the spotlights fade away
and you're escorted through the foyer
You will resume your callow ways
But I was meant for the stage

I have come a few miles
I've got blisters on my slipper'd feet
As I rise
As I rise

California's okay
But I think I might stay in the shade
For a while
For a while

Ladybug, ladybird
You're the prettiest song I heard
In a while
In a while