Blind Man'

[ music: natalie merchant/words: natalie merchant ]



O, baby blankets and baby shoes, baby slippers, baby spoons, walls of baby blue.
Dream child in my head is a nightmare born in a borrowed bed.
Now i know lightning strikes again.
It struck me once, then struck me dead.
My folly grows inside of me.
I eat for two, walk for two, breathe for two now.

Well, the egg man fell down off his shelf.
All the good king's men with all their help struggled 'til the end for a shell they couldn't mend.
You know where this will lead, to hush and rock in the nursery for the kicking one inside of me.
I eat for two, walk for two, breathe for two now.

When the boy was a boy, the girl was a girl, they found each other in a wicked world.
Strong in some respects, but she couldn't stand for the way he begged and gave in.
Pride is for men; young girls should run and hide instead.
Risk the game by taking dares with "yes".
Eat for two, walk for two, breathe for two now.

Walk for two? i'm stumbling.
Breathe for two? i can't breathe.
Five months , how it grows.
Five months now, i begin to show.

[ music: natalie merchant/words: natalie merchant ]


[ musical arrangement: jason osborn/first violin: krista bennion feeney/second violin: mitsuru tsubota/viola: louise schulman/cello: myron lutzke/bassoon: dennis godburn/harpsicord: robert wolin
All belonging to the sait luke's chamber orchestra)/classical guitar: scott kuney/double bass: frank luther (all directed by jason osborn) ]

He fills the flower vases, trims the candle bases, takes small change from the poor box.
Tyler has the key.
He takes nail and hammer to tack up the banner of felt scraps glued together reading,
"jesus lives in me."
Alone in the night he mocks the words of the preacher: "god is feeling your every pain."
Repair the christmas stable, restore the plaster angel.
Her lips begin to crumble and her robes begin to peel.
For bible study in the church basement, hear children gospel citing, matthew 17:15.
Alone in the night he mocks the arms of the preacher raised to the ceiling,
"tell god your pain."

To him the world's defiled.
In lot he sees a likeness there;
He swears this sodom will burn down.
Near sacred blood there's a dance hall where tyler glen saw a black girl and a white boy kissing shamelessly.
Black hands on white shoulders, white hands on black shoulders, dancing, and you know what's more.
He's god's mad disciple, a righteous title, for the word he heard he so misunderstood.
Though simple minded, a crippled man, to know this man is to fear this man, to shake when he comes.
Wasn't it god that let puritans in salem do what they did to the unfaithful?

Boys at the jubilee slowly sink into brown bag whiskey drinking and reeling on their feet.
Girls at the jubilee in low-cut dresses yield to the caresses and the man-handling.
Black hands on white shoulders, white hands on black shoulders, dancing, and you know what's more.

Through the tall blades of grass he heads for the jubilee with a bucket in his right hand full of rags soaked in gasoline.
He lifts the shingles in the dark and slips the rags there underneath.
He strikes a matchstick on the box side and watches the rags ignite.
He climbs the bell tower of the sacred blood to watch the flames rising higher toward the trees.
Sirens wailing now toward the scene.

-- matthew 17:15 --
-- lord have mercy onmy son
-- for he is a lunatick, and
-- sore vexed: for oftimes he
-- falleth into the fire and
-- oftimes into the wate

[ music: dennis drew/words: natalie merchant ]



Tell me what's gone wrong.
I tilt my head there, under the faucet, but when i turn it on -- dry as paper.
Call the neighbors.
Who's to blame for what's going on?
In the dark without a clue i'm just the same as you.

O, they tell us there's poison in the well,
That someone's been a bit untidy and there's been a small spill.
Not a lot, no, just a drop.
But there you are mistaken, you know you are.
I wonder just how long they knew our well was poisoned but they let us just drink on.

O, they tell us there's poison in the well,
That someone's been a bit untidy and there's been a small spill.
All that it amounts to is a tear in a salted sea.
Someone's been a bit untidy, they'll have it cleaned up in a week.
But the week is over and now it's grown into years since i was told that i should be calm, there's nothing to fear here.
But i drank that water for years, my wife and my children.

Tell me, where to now, if your fight for a bearable life can be fought and lost in you backyard?

O, don't tell us there's poison in the well,
That someone's been a bit untidy, that there's been a small spill.
All that it amounts to is a tear in a salted sea.
Someone's been a bit untidy, they'll have it cleaned up in a week.

[ music: natalie merchant/words: natalie merchant ]



To your common sense firm arguments
I won't listen to your voice of reason trying to change my mind.
I mind my feelings and not your words.
Didn't you notice i'm so headstrong even when i know i'm wrong?
Take this to your heart and into your head now:
Before you waste your time, call a truce and call a draw.

What's the use in mapping your views out in orderly form
When it does nothing but confuse and anger me more?
I mind my feelings and not your words.
Didn't you notice i'm so headstrong.
You're talking to a deaf stone wall.
Take this to your heart and into your head now:
The old wives' tale is true, i'll repeat it.
All is fair in love and war, that's how the famous saying goes.

Open up your eyes, see me for what i am:
Cast in iron, i won't break and i won't bend.
Take this to your heart and into your head now:
The old wives' tale is true, i'll repeat it.
All is fair in love and war, that's how the famous saying goes.

If i told you we were out to sea in a bottomless boat,
You'd try anything to save us, you'd try anything to keep us afloat.
And if we were living in a house afire,
I don't believe that you could rush out and escape it and not rescue me.
Take this to your heart and into your head now:
The old wives' tale is true, i'll repeat it.
All is fair in love and war, that's how the famous saying goes.
Listen, i think they were talking to you.

[ music: natalie merchant/words: natalie merchant ]



In the dark night a giant slumbered untouched for centuries
'til awakened by a white man's cry: "this is the eden i was to find."
There were lands to be charted and to be claimed for a crown,
When a hero was made by the length he could stay in this dangerous land of hateful hate.

Curiosity filled the heads of these, there was an upper room they had to see.
Curiosity killed the best of these for a hero's hometown welcoming.
Still they moved on and on.

Who came building missions?
Unswerving men of the cloth who gave their lives in numbers untold so that black sheep entered the fold.
Captured like human livestock, destined for slavery.
Naked, walked to the shore where great ships moored for the hellbound journies.
Bought and sold with a hateful hate.

Curiosity filled the breasts of these with some strange ecstasy.
Curiosity killed the best of these by robbing their lives of dignity.
Still they moved on and on.

Calling men of adventure for a jungle bush safari.
Come conquer the, his claws and teeth.
See death in his eyes to know you're alive.
European homesteads grew up in the colonies with civilized plans for wild hinterlands, their guns and god willing.
Such a hateful hate.

Curiosity spilled the blood of these for their spotted skins and ivory.
Curiosity filled the heads of these madmen with the lies of destiny.
Curiosity spilled the blood of these, then blotted their lives from history.
Curiosity filled the heads of these, one man claimed all that he could see.
Curiosity still entices these madmen with a lusting and a greed.
Their legacy, legacy, legacy...

[ music: natalie merchant & dennis drew/words: natalie merchant ]



Can i be unhappy?
Look at what i see: a beast in furs and crowned in luxury.
He's a wealthy man in the poorest land, a self-appointed king,
And there's no complaining while he's reigning.
The lambs are bare of fleece and cold; the lion has stolen that, i'm told.
There must be some creature mighty as you are.
The lambs go hungry (not fair), the biggest portion is the lion's share.
There must be some creature mighty as you are.

Can i be unhappy?
Listen and agree, no words can shame him or tame him.
The lambs are bare of fleece and cold; the lion has stolen that, i'm told.
There must be some creature mighty as you are.
The lambs go hungry (not fair), the biggest portion is the lion's share.
There must be some creature mighty as you are, as you are.

Razor claws in velvet paws, you dunce in your guarded home,
'til a stronger beast will call on you and pounce upon your throne.

Do we pay? dearly, for the lion takes so greedily
And he knows that what he's taken, it is ours.
That's how the wealth's divided among the lambs and king of the beasts, it is so one-sided.
Until the lamb is king of the beasts we live so one-sided.