Rickie Lee Jones - Drunk On The Striped Table lyrics

In my featherless, sagging, saffron wings, I dance My phoenician, waterlogged, orchestrated and forty foot wings Wave in the air I am drunk laying against the striped table Pushing these banners into the airless beach Waving these flags as i murmur the recipes of prayers to the vendors And the pharisees in bikinis pumping iron against the sun The recipes of semitic vendors, egyptian vendors Shaking their backs against the sun Laughing with the sounds of sheets of metal Splashing the naked pharisees With wild bikinis and the soft fragrance Of dreams And morning I walk on the beach looking for a place to sleep My arms are hidden beneath my sailing skin I am broke and f**ed up and i fall in the sand And sleeping in the warm cradle of a billion rocks I dreamed of cher She came to us in babylon And she was rattling fluently Her true language And she was dressed in high syrian rags Her face had white powder on it and there were Little brown moons beneath her eyes And i saw into her An arabic women parading around naked Powerful, irreverent but still after all Doing it the old egyptian way With sparkling clothes and force Now i awake in the afternoon The arcade is filled with children Families are walking by staring at me Pre-pubescent faces are coming a little too close I don't even remember if i have on any underwear I get up and walk away I never even knew this stuff was here The twirling music, the games, the money This commune living s**s These black panthers s** These harmonica players Should all go back to the north Canada, new jersey, where ever they do that Blowing Ii. I abandon the old way when i first got to san diego. i f**ed anybody i wanted to. i was, however, gang raped by a blues band in an old school bus. that was pretty Horrible. there were only three of them. i can't remember if i got the third on e off me. i think i did. i was so ashamed. Perhaps people think if you don't scream you're not being raped. perhaps they think if you say to yourself, just let him do it and he won't hurt you. or even more Provocative, just let him do it and maybe he'll like you. and of course you've been saying no, no, don't . or pushing but not pushing too much. because you're just a little Girl really, and you're afraid, and you're so tired, and you just want someplace to sleep. That's what it's like when you run away from home. Lots of people will rape you. and you'll let them. just to have a place to sleep. The thing was, after they f**ed me, and all this juice all over my thighs, they didn't even let me sleep there. You think this only happens to me? you're crazy. you think this only happens to girls who are rough? you're wrong. you think this only happens in stories? Look behind you. Still i liked the idea of being a**ertive. i liked the idea of free love in san diego. i liked the idea of saying i want you instead of waiting around so some guy can get his rocks Off thinking you didn't really want him that he won something from you that you didn't want to give him. this strategy, this tradition, is a kind of rape. This idea that men are suppose to win you, that you are suppose to be aloof, is a small but significant dramatization of rape. i do not like it. not one bit. that sam i am that Sam i am. i do not like that sam i am. Now i could no more say get down here and eat this sweet me than i could Swallow a bull fighter Or write names on the walls in blood Or wear the victims horns on my head Or row a boat across the atlantic ocean again And though sometimes i am sitting at the desk, or At a table eating dinner And there is some one, some slave, or some anything Underneath Eating mine alone And no one knows Or eating every ones And everyone is coming I could never bring anything to reality now Reality is cracked by the blows of terrible Men and nights with pointed teeth Snapping poison at the air I breath And all good things now Take place inside my many layered Silence My eyes My lips Are sealed Where did you go When things went bad, anyway? I sat beside you in that bathroom all night. You were crying You were talking to me like a baby You were gone, man, gone You just kept getting in the bath And getting out and letting the water run out And then getting in again And all that food i made It was all over the walls in the kitchen And there was a heat wave And the waves were very, very high And the dogs were turning into carrots And the valentines were melting beneath Burrito and neon Where shattered places pave the road The winding road through echo park That echoes still Your naked body The bed you brought Those stupid lamps Your body echoes The last shadows Of me against you You loved me. You loved me madly Where did you go?i knew you like that scene of girls chasing you down the street. that's why you always liked to have a very hip car, because it was important that they Chase you in the right car, and i was not about to chase you. I knew that story of that italian girl in philadelphia chasing you down the night street you were in a taxi cab, that's a nice image. then the japanese girl. but then my feet Were starting toward you and you were turning the corner onto sunset and you left me there in a second day cold turkey. and all i can think of i philadelphia cheese steak Sandwich philadelphia cheesesteak sandwich. Philadelphia cheese steak and every time i think cheese steak i see all this wet cheese and steak. Here comes the parade! look! here it comes! I let you go. I let you go. you like to rip girls. i had to let you go.