The Ballad Of Todd Rundgren

Instrumental

Izzat love what i feel when you're in my arms
Make me die before i'd do you harm
When you're lost i will lead you home
If you're cold, you know i'll keep you warm
Am i wrong?
Or izzat love when i dream there is no one else
In the end, who's your friend? just myself
Izzat love to forget my pride
To conceal how it feels deep inside
Am i wrong?
Or izzat love?
Izzat love to forgive all those things you've done
If you go still you know i'm the one
Only love, love alone can survive
Deep inside i believe it's alive
Am i wrong?
Or izzat love?

Is that you?
Look who's on the skids this time
Bitchin' 'bout her place in line
And all you really want is attention
'cause you're like every other girl uptown
Who wants to ride her face around
And wave about that power you have to put me down
And so i'll tell ya
To see you like this is nearly tragic
But it's like ruby says our dreams have magic
But i know useless begging won't help me

Yes it's you
You leave me nothing left to say
'cause i thought that we'd return one day
Together to a great sphere of knowledge
But that would never do for you
'cause you thought you knew a thing or two
But you don't even know what is and isn't true
And so i'll tell ya
I was a fool that's why i got burned
But in all that time there's one thing i learned
And that is useless begging won't help me

It's the last ride
Our little game is over
It's the last ride
It's time to take you home
And we can't cry 'cause we seen it coming
No use running, take it slower

It's a dangerous drive
I'm afraid to arrive
But i strive to survive
More a fool than alive
I thought i knew just everything
I had it made and i could coast
But i turned away love when i needed it most

It's the last ride
My little game is over
It's the last ride
It's time to take me home
And i can't cry 'cause i seen it coming
No use running, take it slower

And the road rolls around
And turns through the town
The depression drips down
And glazes the ground
Horizons east and skylines west
The moon, the sun, and all the rest
The loving son, the faithful wife
The burnt out wreck of a poor man's life
The father, son, and holy ghost
They all turned away love when they needed it most

It's the last ride
Their little game is over
It's the last ride
It's time to take them home
And they can't cry 'cause they seen it coming
No use running, take it slower

How about a little fanfare, fanfare?

Love unrequited, robs me of me rest,
Love, hopeless love, my ardent soul encumbers,
Love, nightmare like, lies heavy of me chest,
And weaves itself into my midnight slumbers.

When you're lying awake with a dismal headache and
Repose is taboo'd by anxiety,
I conceive you may use any language you choose to
Indulge in, without impropriety;
For your brain is on fire, the bed-clothes conspire of
Usual slumber to plunder you:
First your counter-pane goes, and uncovers your toes,
And your sheet slips demurely from under you;
Then the blanketing tickles, you feel like mixed
Pickles, so terribly sharp is the pricking,
And you're hot and you're cross, and you tumble and
Toss 'til there's nothing 'twixt you and the
Ticking.
Then the bed-clothes all creep to the ground in a heap
And you pick 'em all up in a tangle;
Next your pillow resigns and politely declines to
Remain at it's usual angle!
Well, you get some repose in the form of a dose, with
Hot eye-balls and head ever aching,
But your slumbering teems with such horrible dreams
That you'd very much better be waking;
For you dream you are crossing the channel, and
Tossing about in a steamer from harwich,
Which is something between a large bathing machine and
A very small second class carriage,
And you're giving a treat (penny ice and cold meat) to
A party of friends and relations,
They're a ravenous horde, and they all come on board
At sloane square and south kensington stations.
And bound on that journey you find your attorney
(who started this morning from devon);
He's a bit undersiz'd and you don't feel surpris'd
When he tells you he's only eleven.
Well you're driving like mad with this singular lad
(by the bye the ship's now a four wheeler),
And you're playing round games, and he calls you bad
Names when you tell him that "ties pay the dealer";
But this you can't stand so you throw up your hand,
And you find you're as cold as an icicle;
In your shirt and your socks (the black silk with gold
Clocks) crossing sal'sbury plain on a bicycle:
And he and the crew are on bicycles too, which they've
Somehow or other invested in,
And he's telling the tars all the particulars of a
Company he's interested in;
It's a scheme of devices, to get at low prices, all
Good from cough mixtures to cables
(which tickled the sailors), by treating retailers as
Though they were all vegetables;
You get a good spadesman to plant a small tradesman
(first take off his boots with a boot tree),
And his legs will take root, and his fingers will
Shoot, and they'll blossom and bud like a fruit
Tree;
From the green grocer tree you get grapes and green
Pea, cauliflower, pine apple and cranberries,
While the pastry cook plant cherry brandy will grant,
Apple puffs, and three corners, and banburys;
The shares are a penny and ever so many are taken by
Rothschild and baring,
And just as a few are allotted to you, you awake
And with a shudder despairing
You're a regular wreck, with a crick in your neck, and
No wonder you snore, for your head's on the floor
And you've needles and pins from your soles to your
Shins, and your flesh is acreep, for your left leg's
Asleep,
And you've cramp in your toes, and a fly on your nose,
And some fluff in your lung, and a feverish tongue,
And a thirst that's intense,
And a general sense that you haven't been sleeping in
Clover;
But the darkness has pass'd, and it's daylight at
Last, and the night has been long, ditto, ditto my
Song,
And thank goodness they're both of them over!

Don't you ever listen?
Don't you ever learn?
The hand may find you
It's time to take a turn
You think this life is something strange
You're ready for another change
But don't you ever learn?

Don't you ever listen?
Don't you ever learn?
The world is on fire
Your body doesn't burn
Kill yourself before receiving
Something out of all this breathing
Don't you ever learn?

It's like a normal times square day on 42nd street
I feel like trashing some windows and crunching some feet
I watch society crumble and i just laugh (hee hee)
They soon will see what it's like to be the other half

But i'm trying
Said i'm trying to forget
And it ain't happened yet

I musta woke up this morning with a bug up my ass
I think i'll just haul off and belt the next jerk that i pass
My old man says i'm just a stoned little punk
But he keeps himself a pistol and he's always drunk

I know
Something's gonna give
Pretty soon
I know it
Something's gonna give
I wanna live
I wanna mess thing whole world around
Go on and poison all the water, use up all the air
Blow your stupid heads off, see if i could care
Put me down but don't blame me for what you did
'cause inside everyone is a heavy metal kid

I was a sweet little kid once
Now i'm a full grown crank
And when i die i'll probably come back as a sherman tank
I know that i could make this world so peaceful and calm
If i could only get my hands on a hydrogen bomb