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Pontchartrain Lyrics
sunday: dark waterdraining north
the heat swells and bursts like plague
sunday: every-so-faint slow tambourine
glides onward toward the grave
who drew the line?
who drew the line between you and me?
who drew the line that everyone sees?
darling, lake pontchartrain is haunted:
bones without names
photographs framed in reeds
darling, what blood our veins was holding
the overpass frozen
fires ablaze at sea
who drew the line?
who drew the line that cuts to the skin, buries me in?
tell me who drew the line
darling, don't close your eyes
(lie as darnkness hardens
lie of our reunion
o lie if god is sleeping
o I believe you now)
darling, lake pontchartrain will cradle me
and all you left behind
listen: ever-so-faint slow motion tambourine
is marching back through time
the heat swells and bursts like plague
sunday: every-so-faint slow tambourine
glides onward toward the grave
who drew the line between you and me?
who drew the line that everyone sees?
bones without names
photographs framed in reeds
darling, what blood our veins was holding
the overpass frozen
fires ablaze at sea
who drew the line that cuts to the skin, buries me in?
tell me who drew the line
darling, don't close your eyes
lie of our reunion
o lie if god is sleeping
o I believe you now)
and all you left behind
listen: ever-so-faint slow motion tambourine
is marching back through time
Add your song meanings, interpretations, facts, memories & more to the community.
Someone's lover who died before their time ("Don't close your eyes")? I suppose Lake Pontchartrain held their memories. It's a very depressing and haunting song, but I love it.
It's about Hurricane Katrina (the mention of Sunday and fires ablaze at sea), the collapse of the levees and how New Orleans was flooded by Lake Pontchartrain.
The mentions of the haunted Lake, the one that cradles the dead - many of the dead lay in the Pontchartrain-flooded streets of New Orleans for weeks afterwards.
"Who drew the line" can refer to many seemingly-arbitrary lines that meant life or death when Katrina hit - where you lived, how much money you had or the color of your skin.
her voice is PERFECT on this song. so eerie. the song itself possesses a stillness that must have emanated through the city the day after the flood.
bridget, i agree with your comment. 'who drew the line' is a great open ended question, which in turn raises even more questions.
her voice is PERFECT on this song. so eerie. the song itself possesses a stillness that must have emanated through the city the day after the flood.
bridget, i agree with your comment. 'who drew the line' is a great open ended question, which in turn raises even more questions.
Vienna Teng did a concert last fall at the college where I work and in the conversation beforehand, she mentioned that she was playing around on the piano, playing the black keys with one hand and the white keys with the other, which led to a song about the racial divisions that were revealed in the devastation of Hurricane Katrina--hence the unsettling quality of the music.