wow... I'm a little late to this thread. Like 3 years. I love Ani! I was just about to post some of my favorite songs to let people read. She is just so damn amazing! I often read her lyrics when I'm high. Really great, great music. This is my favorite song. I'll post others in different posts (I think each song needs a breaking point after it). little plastic castle in a coffee shop in a city which is every coffee shop in every city on a day which is every day i pick up a magazine which is every magazine and read a story then forgot it right away they say goldfish have no memory i guess their lives are much like mine the little plastic castle is a surprise every time it's hard to say if they are happy but they don't seem much to mind from the shape of your shaved head i recognized your silhoutte as you walked out of the sun and sat down and the sight of your sleepy smile eclipsed all the other people as they paused to snear at the two girls from out of town and i said "look at you this morning you are by far the cutest but be careful getting coffee i think these people wanna shoot us or maybe there's some kind of local competition here to see who can be the rudest" people talk about my image like i come in two dimensions like lipstick is a sign of my declining mind like what i happen to be wearing the day that someone takes my picture is my new statement for all of womankind i wish they could see us now in leather bras and rubber shorts like some ridiculous team uniform for some ridiculous new sport quick someone call the girl police and file a report in a coffee shop in a city which is every coffee shop in every city on a day which is every day
out of habit the butter melts out of habit the toast isn't even warm the waitress and the man in the plaid shirt play out a scene they've played so many times before i am watching the sun stumble home in the morning from a bar on the east side of town and the coffee is just water dressed in brown beautiful but boring he visited me yesterday he noticed my fingers and asked me if i would play i didn't really care a lot but i couldn't think of a reason why not i said if you don't come any closer i don't mind if you stay my thighs have been involved in many accidents and now i can't get insured and i don't need to be lured by you my cunt is built like a wound that won't heal and now you don't have to ask because you know how i feel you know how i feel art is why i get up in the morning but my definition ends there and it doesn't seem fair that i'm living for something i can't even define there you are right there in the meantime i don't want to play for you anymore show me what you can do tell me what are you here for i want my old friends i want my old face i want my old mind fuck this time and place the butter melts out of habit
educated guess looks like my crazy family is down one crazy daughter cuz i'm shipwrecked in a desert that once was underwater just looking for a swift turn of phrase some colors to fly as i float by in the parade plus i dream in skin scented sentences of a stronger faster fiercer you and to each noun, verb and predicate i dedicate a vivid hue but you ain't done too well getting past your permanent pastel have you now? yes, the desert seemed so promising and then it paled somehow so school is in session get your chin off your desk now pick up your pencil and turn over your test use your education and take an educated guess about me i've got a slot at eye level like a speakeasy door and i know you know the password cuz i've seen you here before and i've got something sweet for you and i don't care if it is more than you deserve i've got a lot of love and a lot of nerve so watch me while i take this curve yes school is in session get your chin off your desk now pick up your pencil and turn over your test use your education and take an educated guess about me plus i have this whole new family and i'm in love with each of them and i'm on this list called lucky whenever i'm in reach of them and i'm learning how to say that i'd be happy either way with your love i'm calling on the stars above school is in session get your chin off your desk now pick up your pencil turn over your test use your education and take an educated guess about me
self evident (inspired by the WTC disaster) yes, us people are just poems we're 90% metaphor with a leanness of meaning approaching hyper-distillation and once upon a time we were moonshine rushing down the throat of a giraffe yes, rushing down the long hallway despite what the p.a. announcement says yes, rushing down the long stairs with the whiskey of eternity fermented and distilled to eighteen minutes burning down our throats down the hall down the stairs in a building so tall that it will always be there yes, it's part of a pair there on the bow of noah's ark the most prestigious couple just kickin back parked against a perfectly blue sky on a morning beatific in its indian summer breeze on the day that america fell to its knees after strutting around for a century without saying thank you or please and the shock was subsonic and the smoke was deafening between the setup and the punch line cuz we were all on time for work that day we all boarded that plane for to fly and then while the fires were raging we all climbed up on the windowsill and then we all held hands and jumped into the sky and every borough looked up when it heard the first blast and then every dumb action movie was summarily surpassed and the exodus uptown by foot and motorcar looked more like war than anything i've seen so far so far so far so fierce and ingenious a poetic specter so far gone that every jackass newscaster was struck dumb and stumbling over 'oh my god' and 'this is unbelievable' and on and on and i'll tell you what, while we're at it you can keep the pentagon keep the propaganda keep each and every tv that's been trying to convince me to participate in some prep school punk's plan to perpetuate retribution perpetuate retribution even as the blue toxic smoke of our lesson in retribution is still hanging in the air and there's ash on our shoes and there's ash in our hair and there's a fine silt on every mantle from hell's kitchen to brooklyn and the streets are full of stories sudden twists and near misses and soon every open bar is crammed to the rafters with tales of narrowly averted disasters and the whiskey is flowin like never before as all over the country folks just shake their heads and pour so here's a toast to all the folks who live in palestine afghanistan iraq el salvador here's a toast to the folks living on the pine ridge reservation under the stone cold gaze of mt. rushmore here's a toast to all those nurses and doctors who daily provide women with a choice who stand down a threat the size of oklahoma city just to listen to a young woman's voice here's a toast to all the folks on death row right now awaiting the executioner's guillotine who are shackled there with dread and can only escape into their heads to find peace in the form of a dream cuz take away our playstations and we are a third world nation under the thumb of some blue blood royal son who stole the oval office and that phony election i mean it don't take a weatherman to look around and see the weather jeb said he'd deliver florida, folks and boy did he ever and we hold these truths to be self evident: #1 george w. bush is not president #2 america is not a true democracy #3 the media is not fooling me cuz i am a poem heeding hyper-distillation i've got no room for a lie so verbose i'm looking out over my whole human family and i'm raising my glass in a toast here's to our last drink of fossil fuels let us vow to get off of this sauce shoo away the swarms of commuter planes and find that train ticket we lost cuz once upon a time the line followed the river and peeked into all the backyards and the laundry was waving the graffiti was teasing us from brick walls and bridges we were rolling over ridges through valleys under stars i dream of touring like duke ellington in my own railroad car i dream of waiting on the tall blonde wooden benches in a grand station aglow with grace and then standing out on the platform and feeling the air on my face give back the night its distant whistle give the darkness back its soul give the big oil companies the finger finally and relearn how to rock-n-roll yes, the lessons are all around us and a change is waiting there so it's time to pick through the rubble, clean the streets and clear the air get our government to pull its big dick out of the sand of someone else's desert put it back in its pants and quit the hypocritical chants of freedom forever cuz when one lone phone rang in two thousand and one at ten after nine on nine one one which is the number we all called when that lone phone rang right off the wall right off our desk and down the long hall down the long stairs in a building so tall that the whole world turned just to watch it fall and while we're at it remember the first time around? the bomb? the ryder truck? the parking garage? the princess that didn't even feel the pea? remember joking around in our apartment on avenue D? can you imagine how many paper coffee cups would have to change their design following a fantastical reversal of the new york skyline?! it was a joke, of course it was a joke at the time and that was just a few years ago so let the record show that the FBI was all over that case that the plot was obvious and in everybody's face and scoping that scene religiously the CIA or is it KGB? committing countless crimes against humanity with this kind of eventuality as its excuse for abuse after expensive abuse and it didn't have a clue look, another window to see through way up here on the 104th floor look another key another door 10% literal 90% metaphor 3000 some poems disguised as people on an almost too perfect day should be more than pawns in some asshole's passion play so now it's your job and it's my job to make it that way to make sure they didn't die in vain sshhhhhh.... baby listen hear the train?
wow. listening to this right now... amazingly written. my i.q. when i was four years old they tried to test my i.q. they showed me a picture of 3 oranges and a pear they said, which one is different? it does not belong they taught me different is wrong but when i was 13 years old i woke up one morning thighs covered in blood like a war like a warning that i live in a breakable takeable body an ever increasingly valuable body that a woman had come in the night to replace me deface me see, my body is borrowed yeah, i got it on loan for the time in between my mom and some maggots i don't need anyone to hold me i can hold my own i got highways for stretchmarks see where i've grown i sing sometimes like my life is at stake 'cause you're only as loud as the noises you make i'm learning to laugh as hard as i can listen 'cause silence is violence in women and poor people if more people were screaming then i could relax but a good brain ain't diddley if you don't have the facts we live in a breakable takeable world an ever available possible world and we can make music like we can make do genius is in a back beat backseat to nothing if you're dancing especially something stupid like i.q. for every lie i unlearn i learn something new i sing sometimes for the war that i fight 'cause every tool is a weapon - if you hold it right.
I'm listing to this right now... god what a great song. (and yes I'm quite comfortable with my lone ranger Ani discussion. heh) both hands i am walking out in the rain and i am listening to the low moan of the dial tone again and i am getting nowhere with you and i can't let it go and i can't get through... the old woman behind the pink curtains and the closed door on the first floor she's listening through the air shaft to see how long our swan song can last and both hands now use both hands oh, no don't close your eyes i am writing graffiti on your body i am drawing the story of how hard we tried i am watching your chest rise and fall like the tides of my life, and the rest of it all and your bones have been my bedframe and your flesh has been my pillow i am waiting for sleep to offer up the deed with both hands in each other's shadows we grew less and less tall and eventually our theories couldn't explain it all and i'm recording our history now on the bedroom wall and when we leave the landlord will come and paint over it all and i am walking out in the rain and i am listening to the low moan of the dial tone again and i am getting nowhere with you and i can't let it go and i can't get through so now use both hands please use both hands oh, no don't close your eyes i am writing graffiti on your body i am drawing the story of how hard we tried hard we tried how hard we tried
Ok still having a party all by myself in here... I love the Ani... I'm listening to this song currently and I had to stop my work and just go with it. pick yer nose how come i can pick my ears but not my nose who made up that rule anyway how can you say that's the way it is that's just the way it goes why don't you decide for yourself what you can do and what you can say how come i can pick my friends but not my enemies what is it about me that offends what is it about me 'cause you know i'm only five foot two and i'm giggly wiggly tell me again, what did i do why are you scared of me i fight with love and i laugh with rage you've gotta live light enough to see the humor and long enough to see some change i think shy is boring i think depressed is too i think pretty is nice but i'd rather see something new all these plastic people got their plastic surgery but we got a big big beautiful we got it for free who you gonna be if you can't be yourself you can't get it from t.v. you can't force it on anybody else you know they come to clear cut they come to strip mine they come for some of my big butt my big brain or just a little time they wanna take me out to dinner think i'm a bitch if i don't go seems like the people who actually like me won't allow me to say no your idea of a conversation is the third degree but i don't really know you and i don't really want to talk about me 'cause i'm not going to pretend that i don't pick my nose that's just the way it is, my friends that's just the way it goes this is who i am what i do and what i say if you like it, let it be if you don't, please do the same i fight with love i laugh with rage you gotta live light enough to see the humor and long enough to see some change
DBdubbs, you totally shoulda filled me in on this one! I just found it when searching for an old thread about weed coffee that i wanted to link to. Anyway, Ani fans holla back! serpentine pavlov hits me with more bad news every time i answer the phone so i play and i sing and i just let it ring all day when i'm at home a defacto choice of macro or microcosmic melancholy but, baby, any way you slice it i'm thinkin i could just as soon use the time alone yes, the goons have gone global and the CEOs are shredding files and the democrins and the republicrats are flashing their toothy smiles and uncle tom is posing for a photo op with the oval office clan and uncle sam is rigging cockfights in the promised land and that knife you stuck in my back is still there it pinches a little when i sigh and moan and these days i'm thinkin i could just as soon use the time alone cuz all the wrong people have the power of suggestion and the freedom of the press is meaningless if nobody asks a question i mean, causation by definition is such a complex compilation of factors that to even try to say why is to oversimplifly but that's a far cry, isn't it dear? from acting like you're the only one there unrepentantly self-centered and unfair enter all suckers scrambling for the scoop exit mr. eye contact who took his flirt and flew the coop but whatever no matter no fishin trips no fishin cuz mamma's officially out of commission and did i mention in there somewhere did i mention somewhere in there that i traded babe ruth? yes, i traded the only player that was bigger than the game and i can't even tell you why cuz you'd think i'm insane and that's the truth and the music industry mafia is pimping girl power sniping off their sharpshooter singles from their styrofoam towers and hip hop is tied up in the back room with a logo stuffed in its mouth cuz the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house but then i'm getting away from myself as i get closer and closer to home and these days i'm thinkin i could just as soon use the time alone an i must admit today my inner pessimist seems to have got the best of me we start out sugared up on kool-aid and manifest destiny and we memorize all the president's names like little trained monkeys and then we're spit into the world so many spinny-eyed t.v. junkies incapable of unravelling the military industrial mystery preemptively pacified with history book history an i've been around the world now and i can see this about america the mind control is steep here, man the myopia is deep here and behold those that try to expose the reality who really try to realize democracy are shot with rubber bullets and gassed off the streets while the global power brokers are kept clean and discreet behind a wall behind a moat and that is all that's all she wrote an my heart beats an sss o o o sss cuz folks just couldn't care care care less less less as long as every day is superbowl sunday and larger than life women in lingerie are pouting at us from every bus stop shelovesme shelovesmenot shelovesme shelovesmenot... and "big government should not stand between a man and his money" cuz "what's good for business is good for the country" our children still take that lie like communion the same old line the confederacy used on the union conjugate liberty into libertarian and medicate it associate it with deregulation privatization we won't even know we're slaves on a corporate plantation somebody say hallelujah! somebody say damnation! cuz the profit system follows the path of least resistance and the path of least resistance is what makes the river crooked makes it serpentine capitalism is the devil's wet dream so just give me my judy garland drugs and let me get back to work cuz the empire state building is the tallest building in new york and i always got the feeling you just liked to hear it fall off your tongue but i remember my name in your mouth and i don't think i was done hearing it close to my ear on a whisper's way to a moan but pavlov hits me with more bad news every time i answer the phone so i play and i sing and i just let it ring all day when i'm at home a defacto choice of macro or microcosmic melancholy but baby, any way you slice it i'm thinkin i could just as soon use the time alone © 2003 ani difranco / righteous babe music
That is suuuuch a great song! I don't agree with all of Ani's political views, but god I love her lyrics and music. I love talented people.