Go Long

Joanna Newsom

Last night, again
You were in my dreams
Several expendable limbs were at stake
You were a prince, spinning rims
All sentiments indian-given and half-baked
I was brought in on a palanquin
Made of the many bodies of beautiful women
Brought to this place to be examined
Swaying on an elephant a princess of India

We both want the very same thing
We are praying
I am the one to save you
But you don't even own
Your own violence
Run away from home
Your beard is still blue
With the loneliness of you mighty men
With your jaws, and fists, and guitars
And pens, and your sugar lip
But I've never been to the firepits with you mighty men

Who made you this way?
Who made you this way?
Who is going to bear your beautiful children?
Do you think you can just stop
When you're ready for a change?
Who will take care of you
When you're old and dying?

You burn in the Mekong
To prove your worth
Go Long, go Long
Right over the edge of the earth
You have been wronged
Tore up since birth
You have done harm
Others have done worse

Will you tuck your shirt?
Will you leave it loose?
You are badly hurt
You're a silly goose

You are caked in mud
And in blood, and worse
Chew your bitter cud
Grope your little nurse

Do you know why my ankles are bound in gauze
Sickly dressage a princess of Kentucky?
In the middle of the woods
Which were the probable cause
We danced in the lodge
Like two panting monkeys

I will give you a call, for one last hurrah
And if this tale is tall, forgive my scrambling
But you keep palming along the wall
Moving at a blind crawl
But always rambling

Wolf-spider, crouch in your funnel nest
If I knew you, once
Now I know you less
In the sinking sand
Where we've come to rest
Have I had a hand in your loneliness?

When you leave me alone
In this old palace of yours
It starts to get to me
I take to walking
What a woman does is open doors
And it is not a question of locking or unlocking

Well, I have never seen
Such a terrible room
Gilded with the gold teeth
Of the women who loved you
Though I die Magpie
This I bequeath
By any other name
A jay is still blue

With the loneliness
Of you mighty men
With your mighty kiss
That might never, never end
While, so far away
In the seat of the west
Burns the fount of the heat
Of that loneliness

There's a man who only will speak in code
Backing slowly, slowly down the road
May he master everything
That such men may know
About loving, and then letting go