Patricia Barber

Summer pales, like a ghost of stubborn Spring
This itch, this prayerful longing for heat
Belies an angel's desire to take wing

So as you fall, then fall into me sweet
Persephone now your poet and guide
Night after day after night, I'll complete

Your saintly goodness with its darker side
As one without the other is naive
Past Limbo, to the Second Circle we slide:

chorus
When first you whisper that little white lie
The gods will laugh
The gods will cry

In this soft circle, Reason's slave to desire
This feels like fun
This feels like fire

These small indiscretions get lost over time
So much like love
So much like crime

As fine fine fabric slipping over your skin
This feels like silk
This feels like sin


bridge
Like a gentle dirty dream
Like a room where you can hide
Like confession in your sleep
Like expression sanctified
Like a devil, like a friend
Like a doctor who can end your pain

Like a pillow, like a kiss
Like a party, like a pill
Like a priest my lovely lips
As redemptation will fulfill
Every spectral midnight fantasy
Each and every damning desire to be
Complicit with me

And as I leave you softly under the stars
Without a scratch
Wthout a scar

Like hell on earth slipping under your skin
This feels like love
This feels like sin

You'd be so easy to love
So easy to idolize, all others above
So worth the yearning for
So worth keeping the home fires burning for

We'd be so grand at the game
So carefree together that it's
It does seem a shame
That you can't see your future with me
'Cause you'd be oh so easy to love

We'd be so grand at the game
So carefree together that
It does seem a shame
That you can't see your future with me
'Cause you'd be oh so easy to love

They say that I don't know love, I say yes I do
They say they are counting love, I say I am too
They mark the years with rings like a tree they say
I count on smaller things, minutes, seconds, days

I wait for late afternoon and you
The industrious bunch through breakfast and lunch
[Incomprehensible]
I wait for it afternoon and you

The Monday sun softly paves by two
Though the book of the clerks thinking diligence works
For pension and perks out due
I wait for late afternoon and you

If we agree to meet at three
The concierge and I will see
The shades are drawn, the staff is skilled
Our lunch prepared, the champaign chilled

And if we skip the duck confit
Your arms and lips will reach for me
These walls were meant to never speak
Of songs contempt within a week

So on this late afternoon with you
Other salesmen reserved all the rumors they've heard
That this fool may deserve a review
And still I wait and I wait for you
I wait for late afternoon and you

I get no kick from champagne
Mere alcohol doesn't thrill me at all
So tell me why should it be true
I get a kick out of you?

I get no kick from cocaine
I'm sure if I took even one sniff
It would bore me terrificly too
But I get a kick out of you

I get a kick every time I see you
Standing there before me
I get a kick though it's clear to me
You obviously don't adore me

I get no kick in a plane
Flying too high with some guy in the sky
Is my idea of nothing to do
But I get a kick out of you

I get a kick every time I see you
Standing there before me
I get a kick though it's clear to me
You obviously don't adore me

I get no kick in a plane
Flying too high with some guy in the sky
Is my idea of nothing to do
But I get a kick out of you

At words poetic I'm so pathetic
That I always have found it best
Instead of getting it off my chest
To let 'em rest unexpressed
I hate parading my serenading
As I'll probably miss a bar
But if this ditty is not so pretty
At least it'll tell you how great you are
You're the top - you're the Coliseum
You're the top -
Mmm? you're the Louvre museum
You're a melody from a symphony by Strauss
You're a Bendel bonnet, a Shakespeare sonnet, You're Mickey Mouse
You're the Nile - You're the tower of Pisa
You're the smile - on the Mona Lisa
I'm a worthless check, a total wreck, a flop
But if baby I'm the bottom, you're the top

You're the top, you're Mahatma Ghandi
You're the top - you are Napoleon brandy
You're the purple light of a summer night in Spain
You're the National Gallery
You're Garbo's salary
You're cellophane
You are sublime, you're a turkey dinner
You're the time - the time of the Derby winner
I'm a toy balloon that is fated soon to pop
But if baby I'm the bottom, you're the top, top

Steve, there is something I got to tell ya
What is it Judy?
Well, umm?

You're the top (I am?) - mmm ?You're a Waldorf salad
Oh No, no let me say it
You're the top (me too?) - You're a Berlin ballad You're the nimble tread of
The feet of Fred Astaire
(Actually I don't dance very well)
You're an O'Neill drama, you're Whistler's Mother -
Mama (oh), You're Camembert
You're a rose, (mmm. sweet)
You're Inferno's Dante
You're the nose - watch it!I mean
Whatwhatwhawha what- on the great Durante.That's better
I'm the lazy lout who is just about to storm Let's not storm
But if baby I'm the bottom
She's the one for me
And I've got 'im
'Cause if baby I'm the bottom
You're the top

It was just one of those things
One of those crazy fling
One of those bells that now and then rings
It was just one of those things

It was just one of those nights
One of those fabulous flights
A trip to the moon on gossamer wings
One of those things

If we had thought a bit
Of the end of it when we started painting the town
We had been aware that our love affair
Was too hot not too cool down

So goodbye, dear and amen
Here's hoping we'll meet now and then
It was great fun but it was just one of those things

If we had thought a bit
Of the end of it when we started painting the town
We'd been aware that our love affair
Was too hot not too cool down

So goodbye, dear and amen
Here's hoping we'll meet now and then
It was great fun but it was just one of those things
It was just one of those things

Do you think of me like snow
Cool, slippery and white?
Do you think of me like jazz
As hip as black as night?

Do you think of me like linen
Summer sheets on which you sleep?
Do you think of me like ink
Skinny words you want to keep?

Do you think of me like fat
Irresistible as cream?
On your lips, on your hips
Like chocolate or like a dream

Ohh, to be the moon
A diamond you can't resist
The space between the stars
Do you think of me like this?

Do you think of me like crack
Illegally refined?
Sunglass for your eyes
Do you think that love is blind?

Do you think of me like salt?
Do you taste me in your tears?
Do you think of me like oil?
Filthy rich, my dear

I think of you like food
I think of you like wine
I shouldn't lick my fingers
I'm drinking all the time

I think of you like paint
Flesh tones and pink
I think of you like rhyme
So much it makes me think
I'm mad about you

Do you think of me like sand
Warm southern fire?
Take me with you in the dark
And secret in your mind

Do you think of me like snow
School starting in the fall?
Do you think of me in spring
Do you think of me at all?

When love comes in and takes you for a spin
Ooh, la, la, la, la, c'est magnifique
When every night your loved one holds you tight
Ooh, la, la, la, c'est magnifique

But when one day your loved one drifts away
Ooh, la, la, la, la, it is so tragique
But when once more she whispers je t'adore
C'est magnifique

When love comes in and takes you for a spin
Ooh, la, la, la, la, c'est magnifique
When every night your loved one holds you tight
Ooh, la, la, la, c'est magnifique

But when one day your loved one drifts away
Ooh, la, la, la, la, it is so tragique
But when once more she whispers je t'adore
C'est magnifique

Get out of town before it's too late my love
Get out of town be good to me please
Why wish me harm? Why not retire to a farm
And be contented to charm the birds off the trees?

Just disappear, I care for you much too much
And when you're near close to me dear we touch too much
The thrill when we meet is so bittersweet
That darling it's getting me down, so on your mark get set get out of town

Just disappear, I care for you much too much
And when you're near close to me dear we touch too much
The thrill when we meet is so bittersweet
That darling it's getting me down, so on your mark get set get out of town

Whenever skies look gray to me
And troubles begin to brew
Whenever the winter winds become too strong
I concentrate on you

When fortune cries nay, nay to me
And people declare we're through
Whenever the blues become my only song
I concentrate on you

On your smile so sweet, so tender
When at first my kiss you decline
Oh, the light in your eyes when you surrender
And once again our arms intertwine

And so when wise men say to me
That love's young dreams never come true
To prove that even wise men can be wrong
I concentrate on you

Your smile so sweet, so tender
When at first my kiss you decline
Oh, the light in your eyes when you surrender
And once again our arms intertwine

And so when wise men say to me
That love's young dreams never come true
To prove that even wise men can be wrong
I concentrate on you
I concentrate and concentrate on you

In the still of the night as I gaze out of my window
At the moon in it's flight my thoughts all stray to you
In the still of the night while the world is in slumber
Oh, the times without number, darling when I say to you

Do you love me as I love you?
Are you my life to be, my dream come true
Or will this dream of mine fade out of sight?

Do you love me as I love you?
Are you my life to be, my dream come true
Or will this dream of mine fade out of sight?

Like the moon growing dim on the rim of the hill
In the chill still of the night

Miss Otis regrets she's unable to lunch today, madam
Miss Otis regrets she's unable to lunch today
She is sorry to be delayed
But last evening down in lover's lane she strayed, madam
Miss Otis regrets she's unable to lunch today

When she woke up and found that her dream of love was gone, madam
She ran to the man who had lead her so far, far astray
And from under her velvet gown
She drew a gun and shot her lover down, madam
Miss Otis regrets she's unable to lunch today

When the mob came and got her and dragged her from the jail, madam
When they strung her up on the old willow across the way
The moment before she died
She lifted up her lovely head and cried, madam
Miss Otis regrets she's unable to lunch today

You'd be so easy to love
So easy to idolize, all others above
So worth the yearning for
So worth keeping the home fires burning for

We'd be so grand at the game
So carefree together that it's
It does seem a shame
That you can't see your future with me
'Cause you'd be oh so easy to love

We'd be so grand at the game
So carefree together that
It does seem a shame
That you can't see your future with me
'Cause you'd be oh so easy to love

The thrill is gone
The thrill is gone
I can see it in your eyes
I can hear it in your sighs
Feel your touch and realize
The thrill is gone.

The nights are cold,
For love is old,
Love was grand when love was new,
Birds were singin', skies were blue,
Now it don't appeal to you..
The thrill is gone.

This is the end,
So why pretend
And let it linger on?
The thrill is gone.

This is the end,
So why pretend
And let it linger on?
The thrill is gone.

I've got a brain that's black and blue
a waking state that feels like slumber
can't find guitars that scream like you
a raw desire that pulls me under
This is too rich for my blood

Inside the cold of small success
the chilling glare of younger failure
a stranger turns away the rest
and finds in me a well-worn savior
This is too rich for my blood

A heart that's torn, a sun still shines
a broken man finds strength to labor
a memory that's past it's prime
will burn my frozen nights forever
This is too rich for my blood