*Rene and Georgette Magritte
With their dog after the war
Returned to their hotelsuite
And they unlocked the door. . .
. . .The easy stream of laughter
Flowing through the air
Rene and Georgette Magritte
With their dog apres la guerre*
Rene And Georgette Magritte With Their Dog After The War - Paul Simon
Based on a photo of the painter and his wife and dog. I had to look that one up.
Vatican Rag has some good ones too.
Do whatever steps you want if
You have cleared them with the Pontiff
Everybody say his own Kyrie Eleison
Two, four , six, eight, time to transsubstantiate! (That one cracks me up every time.)
Make a cross on your abdomen,
When in Rome do like the Roman,
Ave Maria, gee it’s good to see ya. . .
(I could go on with Lehrer lyrics for days.)
First you get down on your knees,
Fiddle with your rosaries,
Bow your head with great respect and
Genuflect, genuflect, genuflect!
No need to google…I can do 'em from memory.
Well, I remember laughing the first time I heard these lyrics:
“Oh I swear to you
I’ll be there for you
This is not a drive by
Just a shy guy
Looking for a two-ply
Hefty bag to hold my
Love.”
The imagery of that is astonishing. Train, of course, which, as noted already, excels in such lyrics.
The last verse of New Order’s “Your Silent Face”
A sound formed in a vacuum may seem a waste of time
It’s always been just the same
No hearing, or breathing, no movement, no lyrics, just nothing
A sign that leads the way
A path we cannot take
You’ve caught me at a bad time
So why don’t you … piss off
The Flight of the Concords’ song lyrics are almost always unexpected:
Lives are like retractable pencils
If you push them too hard they’re gonna break
And people are like paper dolls
Paper dolls and people, they’re a similar shape
Hmm hmm hm
Love is like a roll of tape
It’s real good for making two things one
But just like that roll of tape
Love sometimes breaks off before you were done
Another way that love is similar to tape
That I’ve noticed
Is sometimes it’s hard to see the end
You search on the roll
(Search on the roll)
Search on the roll
(Searching round the roll)
Search on the roll
(Search)
With your fingernail
Again and again
And again and again
And again.
Tape of Love
I dim the lights down very low, here we go
You’re so beautiful
You could be a waitress
You’re so beautiful
You could be an air hostess in the 60s
You’re so beautiful
You could be a part…time…model
The Most Beautiful Girl In The Room
Tuesday night is the night that we usually go to your mother’s place
And I teach her how to use the video machine again,
But Wednesday night is the night that we’re making love
When everything is just right:
You’re not to tired from your after-work social netball team practice
There’s nothing good on tv,
Mmmmm… Conditions are perfect for making love
Business Time
They call me the Hiphopopotamus
Flows that glow like phosphorous
Poppin’ off the top of this esophagus
Rockin’ this metropolis
I’m not a large water-dwelling mammal
Where did you get that preposterous hypothesis?
Did Steve tell you that, perchance?
Steve.
Hiphopopotamus
“Your lips were like a red and ruby chalice warmer than the summer night,
The clouds were like an alabaster palace rising to a snowy height, …
I could see the midnight sun.”
And I’ve always loved this lyric, from the Fifth Dimension “Last night . . .”
“Should call you up and just forget my foolish pride
I heard your number ringin’, I went cold inside”
And from Lloyd Price’s “Stagger Lee”
“Stagger Lee shot Billy
Oh, he shot that poor boy so bad
Till the bullet came through Billy
And it broke the bartender’s glass”
Cole Porter was the master of weird and delightful rhymes. From one song “You’re The Top” a few examples:
gifted humans | Vincent Youmans
Mahatma Gandhi | Napoleon Brandy
National Gallery | Garbo’s salary
turkey dinner | Derby winner
Inferno’s Dante | the great Durante
Waldorf salad | Berlin ballad
Procol Harum, back in the psychedelic days. A “really, deep, man” recitation over hippie music.
Until the last line.
*In the darkness of the night,
Only occasionally relieved by glimpses of Nirvana
As seen through other people’s windows,
Wallowing in a morass of self-despair
Made only more painful by the knowledge
That all I am is of my own making …
When everything around me, even the kitchen ceiling,
Has collapsed and crumbled without warning.
And I am left, standing alive and well,
Looking up and wondering why and wherefore.
At a time like this, which exists maybe only for me,
But is nonetheless real, if I can communicate,
And in the telling and the bearing of my soul
Anything is gained, even though the words
Which I use are pretentious and make you cringe
With embarrassment, let me remind you of the pilgrim
Who asked for an audience with the Dalai Lama.
He was told he must first spend five years in contemplation.
After the five years
He was ushered into the Dalai Lama’s presence, who said,
‘Well, my son, what do you wish to know?’
So the pilgrim said,
‘I wish to know the meaning of life, father.’
And the Dalai Lama smiled and said…*
‘Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn’t it?’
Asia, Africa
The wild dogs cry out in the night
As they grow restless, longing for some solitary company
I know that I must do what’s right
As sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti
There’s just something fundamentally *wrong *with that last line.
Darn it, ChefGuy. I was going to mention Hiphopopotamus vs. Rhymenoceros.
And if you rap like me you don’t get paid!
And if you roll like me you don’t get laid!
I had a taste of the real world (Just a drop of it)
When I went down on you, girl, oh.
Miracles, Jefferson Starship