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Stories of the Street Lyrics
The stories of the street are mine, the Spanish voices laugh.
The Cadillacs go creeping now through the night and the poison gas,
and I lean from my window sill in this old hotel I chose,
yes one hand on my suicide, one hand on the rose.
I know you've heard it's over now and war must surely come,
the cities they are broke in half and the middle men are gone.
But let me ask you one more time, O children of the dusk,
All these hunters who are shrieking now oh do they speak for us?
And where do all these highways go, now that we are free?
Why are the armies marching still that were coming home to me?
O lady with your legs so fine O stranger at your wheel,
You are locked into your suffering and your pleasures are the seal.
The age of lust is giving birth, and both the parents ask
the nurse to tell them fairy tales on both sides of the glass.
And now the infant with his cord is hauled in like a kite,
and one eye filled with blueprints, one eye filled with night.
O come with me my little one, we will find that farm
and grow us grass and apples there and keep all the animals warm.
And if by chance I wake at night and I ask you who I am,
O take me to the slaughterhouse, I will wait there with the lamb.
With one hand on the hexagram and one hand on the girl
I balance on a wishing well that all men call the world.
We are so small between the stars, so large against the sky,
and lost among the subway crowds I try to catch your eye.
The Cadillacs go creeping now through the night and the poison gas,
and I lean from my window sill in this old hotel I chose,
yes one hand on my suicide, one hand on the rose.
the cities they are broke in half and the middle men are gone.
But let me ask you one more time, O children of the dusk,
All these hunters who are shrieking now oh do they speak for us?
Why are the armies marching still that were coming home to me?
O lady with your legs so fine O stranger at your wheel,
You are locked into your suffering and your pleasures are the seal.
the nurse to tell them fairy tales on both sides of the glass.
And now the infant with his cord is hauled in like a kite,
and one eye filled with blueprints, one eye filled with night.
and grow us grass and apples there and keep all the animals warm.
And if by chance I wake at night and I ask you who I am,
O take me to the slaughterhouse, I will wait there with the lamb.
I balance on a wishing well that all men call the world.
We are so small between the stars, so large against the sky,
and lost among the subway crowds I try to catch your eye.
Song Info
Submitted by
hosimosi On Mar 26, 2002
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"We are so small between the stars, so large against the sky, and lost among the subway crowds I try to catch your eye."
This is probably one of my favorites lines of all time. It perfectly summarizes urban angst and loneliness in one poetic swoop.
I have read that Cohen's visited Havana around the time of the revolution in Cuba and there or after wrote this.
Definitely seems to be about the Cuban revolution, and Leonad's disillusionment...(I'm not a history buff, here, so forgive me if I don't have the details of the Cuban revolution 100% accurate...). "The Cadillacs go creeping now through the night and the poison gas" -- basically the "haves" driving in nice cars through the neighborhoods of the "have-nots" that are filled with poison gas, in ruins etc. The disillusionment part is I think best expressed by "All these hunters who are shrieking now oh do they speak for us?" The revolutionary side of the war made a lot of claims about bettering the lives of the common man... whether or not they succeeded I suppose depends on your political philosophies... but Leonard seems to be questioning if the revolutionaries are truly advocates of the people, or if they are using public sentiment to gain political/military power. The next stanza to the end(starting "And where do all these highways go...") seems to be in the aftermath of the war... kind of a where do we go now? Are we really better off? Both sides want to hear fairy tales of how things are going to get better now, but are they really?
I hear echoes of W.B. Yeats "Stolen Child" quite clearly in this lyric run through Cohen's dark, distorted mirror.