| Baby
Who Are You
Baby, who are you?
Baby, who are you?
I'm so blue for you
I'm so blue for you
While you lie asleep
While you lie asleep
I just sit and weep
I just sit and weep
When did the darkness take you
And carry you out to sea
How did I come to wake to
This stranger next to me
Baby, who are you?
Baby, who are you?
I'm so blue
Are you?
I'm so blue
Are you?
[Break]
It's just too sad to mention
Watching a good thing end
I've got a simple question
What happened to my friend?
Baby, who are you?
Baby, who are you?
I'm still true
Are you?
I'm still true
Are you?
© September 30, 1998
Dear Miss Lucy
I'm not inclined
To think you'd mind
If I dropped by for tea
Please excuse me
Dear Miss Lucy
But we need to chat about
Someone I'm mad about
Now it's a fact
That he's attached
To your strange artistry
But don't refuse me
Dear Miss Lucy
Send him back home to me
He should be spending Sundays
Over a charcoal grill
Or tuning the family Hyundai
Not at some bachanalia
Hog-tied in black regalia
That a whip
Should make him flip
Comes as news to me
Still Miss Lucy
Don't refuse me
Just set the poor boy free
(Break 1)
After I learned to trust him
And gave him my heart to keep
You went ahead and trussed him
Now he sings Rigoletto
Under a black stiletto
You've worked in-
To his skin
Like fine cutlery
But don't refuse me
Dear Miss Lucy
He still belongs to me
(Break 2)
Despite all the tricks you're skilled in
These are the ties that bind
Flanked by his wife and children
Doing his Rigoletto
Under my black stiletto
So send him 'round
Gagged and bound
Back to his family
Don't refuse me
Dear Miss Lucy
I'll do you proud you'll see
Don't refuse me
Dear Miss Lucy
He still belongs to me
@ 3 /16-25 /94 David Cantor
Far Worse Off
I've got it bad
But there is someone is such far worse shoes
And though it makes me sad to contemplate
My sorry fate
Hers is one I would not choose
You hurt me so
With your silky words and roving eye
Still it helps to know
That in this world
There's some poor girl
Who's far worse off than I
Don't know if she has money
Or where she went to school
Don't even know what makes her laugh
Still I feel sorry for the fool
I've been through hell
But there is someone in a far worse place
For the truth to tell
This sorry Eve
For whom I grieve
Has never seen your face
She may toss quotes from Sartre
Or dig for Inca in Peru
She may recite some Buddhist chant
But still she's hasn't got a clue
Ah, that poor girl
Who was put on earth to live and die
Without the chance to feel the pain I do
In loving you
She's far worse off than I
She's far worse off than I
Florida Time
Jawolski came by Sunday,
Gave ten points on the Colts.
He looks just like Ted Bundy did
The day he ate the volts.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
You can hardly make the steak out
From the gristle and the bone.
I would've ordered take out
If they'd let me use the phone.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
I missed my wife the other day.
I've pissed my lovin' life away.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
The lakes of hell won't freeze us.
The fires of hell won't burn.
'Cause I've been touched by Jesus
And I've touched him in return.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
The Devil came to life one day,
But did not throw the knife away.
Now I'm doing FLORIDA TIME.
(Instrumental)
The chaplain reeks of highballs.
There's nothing he won't bless.
The flaps are for the eyeballs,
So there wont be a mess.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
My mother's eyes were blue and clear.
Now why should I be sitting here
Doin' FLORIDA TIME?
It's been eight years since I sliced her.
But you still can taste the fear.
A shame that do good shyster
Couldn't catch the governor's ear.
'Cause it's FLORIDA TIME.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
I missed my wife the other day.
I've pissed my lovin' life away.
Doin' FLORIDA TIME.
© April 23 25, 1991 David Cantor
Katmandu
Our dinner burns, our leader speaks,
Berlin is on the line.
I haven't called Louise in weeks.
I'm sure she's feeling fine.
They're shipping beer to Belfast.
They're tossing coins to fight the flu.
Well, here you are
And so am I,
What are we going to do?
Jehovah's witness came today
But could not pick the lock.
She stood awhile, then flew away.
You'd think she'd learn to knock.
I'm shipping tea to China.
I'm sending crows to KATMANDU.
Now here you are
And so am I,
What are we going to do?
It's not like we've become two prisoners
Chained by the ankles to this room.
It's just your classic case of his and hers.
Except this his and hers
Might just seal up like a tomb.
The TV hums, the newsmen talk.
A sense of things implied.
I read the papers like a hawk
For signs of life outside.
I'm on the trail of nothing.
And looking hard to find a clue.
Well, here you are
And so am I,
What are we going ...
What are we going ...
What are we going to do?
What are we going to do?
© Jan. 28 29, 1992 David Cantor
Lilly One-Ten-One-Forty™
I was standing still
By the window sill
I was thinking about my honey
I'd been thrown for a loop
When he'd flown the coop
With my best friend, my car and my money
They were found one day
In a heap of clay
A tragic and sad, sad story
I stayed home and cried
Till the doctor arrived
With his Lilly One-Ten-One-Forty™
Chorus:
Woe was me
I was wallowing in misery
Gone astray
Till that little pill saved the day
One day side by side
Dr. Weiss and I
Were working on my depression
When my wayward past
Returned home at last
And burst in on our session
What an awful scene
When the coroner came
To collect the good doctor's body
Took him several trips
As I sealed my lips
With some Lilly One-Ten-One-Forty™
Lilly One-Ten-One-Forty™
Chorus:
Woe was me
I was wallowing in misery
Glory be
When that little pill set me free
Sometimes I dream of an island grove
Or drifting alone on the bay
Sometimes I lie on a sunlight cove
As my sorrows melt away
Now the trial was short
For my day in court
And I stood to hear the sentence
But the judge was kind
And he judged my mind
To be both non compis and non mentis
So he closed the book
Let me off the hook
With a stern and judicious warning
Then the bailiff came by
With a ten-year supply
Of Lilly One-Ten-One-Forty™
Lilly One-Ten-One-Forty™
Sometimes I dream of an island breeze
Blowing the face of the sand
Sometimes I'm watching the island trees
As the tension leaves my hand
So whether young or old
If I may be bold
You can learn something from my story
When you need a lift
You just take the fifth
With some Lilly One-Ten-One-Forty™
Woe was me
I was heading straight for infamy
Glory be
When that little pill set me free
© Feb. 20, 1998 David Cantor
Leave a Light On for
Misery
She owns a mint-green Eldorado
She's given lectures at the Prado
She moves through air so easily
Leave a light on for Misery
She got her Masters in Derision
She likes the big screen television
This makes for thrilling company
Leave a light on for Misery
...Misery
Leave a light on for Misery
They speak her name
In Katmandu
They know her well
In Ghana too
Break out the bowl
But she won't stir
It's not her fault
It's not her fault
You're not like her
Her evening wear is understated
She thinks Foucault is overrated
She says she has big plans for me
Leave a light on for Misery
...Misery
Leave a light on for Misery
[Instrumental Break]
Watching the sunrise
From Big Sur
The ocean holds
No charm for her
Break out the bowl
And she'll take two
It's not your fault
It's not your fault
She's just like you
She spans the globe like Coronado
Knows all the words to "Desperado"
She says she has big plans for me
Leave a light on for Misery
...Misery
Leave a light on for Misery
© Sept. 12, 1998 David Cantor
Slow Boat to China
Found my passport
Found a friend to take the cat
And a kid with too much money
Who wants to renovate my flat
'Cause I'm leaving
On a slow boat to China
I'm doing the China tour
There was this guy I met
He had a birthmark on his knee
But he had more respect for Nixon
Than he had for me
So come tomorrow
I'm on that slow boat to China
I'm doing the China cure
I'll be walking
On that great wall mighty soon
Where the emperor and his armies
Stood their ground
And the river
Where the poet kissed the moon
And drowned
Once I get there
It's an even money bet
That I'll only brood the harder
On what I'm trying to forget
Still I'm leaving
On that slow boat to China
I'm doing the China tour
I'm taking that Chinese cure
© David Cantor
Still, I Adore You
You can laugh when I cry. You may laugh the day I die. You're such a
pill.
And fit to kill.
But STILL, I ADORE YOU.
When I stumble home to bed,
And my arm bumps some strange head. I get mad
To think I've been had.
But STILL, I ADORE YOU.
My skin gets such a glow
With the joy your kisses bring to me. Such joy: it's easy to say "no"
To every toy that tries to cling to me. They couldn't mean a thing to
me.
I should buy myself a knife,
And simply cut you from my life. I wish I could.
You're just no damn good.
But STILL, I ADORE YOU.
(Instrumental Break)
It's not the time or place
To count the ways you've made a fool of me. Such ways: I can scarcely
show my face.
And though you can't help but be cruel to me, Still, you're such a jewel
to me.
Though you joke when I weep, If I spoke in my sleep. Plain as day,
You would hear me say:
"But STILL, I ADORE YOU."
Plain as day,
You'd hear me say:
"But STILL, I ADORE YOU."
© June 25, 1990 David Cantor
I Always Get Drunk
at Voletta's
Down in the depths of the section of town called Tribeca
Down past El Teddy's, east of the Nick at Nite sign
There's a cool little hang
A sort of post-modern mecca
Where the cream of the downtown elite
Come to howl and unwind
It's a weird little sanctum
A sort of Gertrude-cum-Alice
Full of virtual artists
And post-grad Columbia freaks
It's a veritable orgy of ego,
Pretension and malice
So it goes without saying
That I'm there every week
I always get drunk at Voletta's
She has the will that I lack
I always get drunk at Voletta's
And Voletta takes note of the fact
It's not even ten
And already they're busting the door down
Hipsters with scratch
And dipsters who haven't a clue
Some tattoo-skulled poet named Paco
Has mixed me a highball
It's a night to get loaded
It's a night to cut loose
I always get drunk at Voletta's
She's a vision in black
I always get drunk at Voletta's
Yes, I always get drunk...
...drunk at Voletta's
Suddenly Paco has bolted the joint
With some flyboy named Nevill
Now am I going crazy
Or did every guy in here turn gay
I don't know what's higher
Me or the pheromone level
The one thing that's certain
Is that none of it's coming my way
Just then Voletta comes by
And it's clear she can sense my frustration
She massages my neck
And this causes my chakras to spin
"Just a couple of hours" she purrs
"And it'll all come together
'Cause when the party clears out
Then the party can really begin"
I always get drunk at Voletta's
She's a vision in black
I always get drunk at Voletta's
There's a still in the back
I always get drunk at Voletta's
She has the will that I lack
I always get drunk at Voletta's
And Voletta always lets me come back
© David Cantor
When Kafka Was the Rage
The pipes in my room begin seething
As I lie in bed barely breathing
Though I always knew
We'd be legends one day
I'd never have guessed you
To do it that way
We tried our best to be frugal
And liquor was cheap on MacDougal
We posed under streetlamps
As if we were on stage
When Kafka was the rage
I saw the world as empty,
Corrupted and absurd
I was quite the haunting figure then
So thin and self-assured
And half a dozen women
Devoured my every word
And I took it all in stride
Took it all in stride
I put the whole world on notice
While you strained to master the lotus
Joyce was a titan
And Miller was a sage
When Kafka was the rage
A brilliant new world order
Was rising in my head
And at least a dozen women
Were eager to be led
While Blake's Collected Poems
Collected dust beside my bed
And I took it all in stride
Took it all in stride
Was it by chance or mere magic
That one simple glance
Proved so tragic
I was half-crazy
And you were half my age
When Kafka was the rage
When Kafka was the rage
© 10.19.98 David Cantor
Won Gon Ju
Won Gon Ju
Came by way of Singapore to old New York
He's dined on matzoh ball and Mu Shu Pork
He eats his dumplings with a knife and fork
Won Gon Ju
He likes the derma and the won-ton too
I doubt there's ever been a Don Juan who
Could break a woman's heart like Won Gon Ju
Bridge: His soulful sighs
His savoir faire
Those almond eyes
That curly hair
The devilish grin
That never cloys
The days of sin
Those nights of joy
Won Gon Ju
He said his love for me was real and true
Until it came to say the words "I do"
That was the last I saw of Won Gon Ju
[Instrumental Break]
Bridge: The saffron skin
The sanguine mouth
The way I spin
Both north and south
He made his kill
I do confess
Oh, what a thrill
How East meets West
In Won Gon Ju
He'll walk the earth until his search is through
'Cause when it came to say those words "I do"
That was the last I saw of Won Gon Ju
Sad but true
Because the man I love is Won Gon Ju
© 1/6/97 David Cantor
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