Ani DiFranco

[fox69]

"Rain Check"

"Rain Check"



As dolls go I am broken
And you could just let that get us off the hook
But from under the umbrella of the unspoken
I see you giving me that look

Baby, you're right as rain about the benefits
But you might be wrong about the costs
And it feeds my heart that you came looking for me
But I'm thinkin I need to stay lost

So I won't say I saw you fibbing
Or jump-jigging across the floor
I won't say you walked me to my car
And draped your arm on my open door

I know my mind is made of matter
But I need to know exactly
What is the matter at it's core?
Because my heart is just a muscle
And simply put, it's sore

So never mind about the benefits
And never mind about the costs
That don't change the basic premises
In which I am surely lost

So I won't say I saw you fibbing
Or jump-jigging across the floor
I won't say you walked me to my car
And draped your arm on my open door

 

[fox69]

"Rainy Parade"

"Rainy Parade"



Are you facing east or west
Or north or south?
When it gets cold outside
Do you get brought in
Or do you get left out?
Are you in the shade of something bigger
Or are you right out in the sun?
Are you down there in the trenches
Or at the top of the mountain?

Either way you better take your lemons
And make your lemonade
Life’s a rainy parade

Have you felt the longing in a seed?
Have you felt it swimming in its need?
Pushing through into the light
Then you know what I’m sayin’
When I’m sayin’ it’s gonna be alright

You just got to take your lemons
And make your lemonade
Have your rainy parade

Listen to the beating of the drum
Look at the smiles on everyone
Who says it’s better to be dry?
The mighty oak trees are so happy right now
They could cry

So you best better take your lemons
And make your lemonade
Have your rainy parade

 

[fox69]

"Reckoning"

"Reckoning"



you can doubt anything if you think about it long enough. cause what
happened always adjusts to fit what happened after that. and it's hard to feel
like you are free. all you seem to do is referee. i remember when it was just
you and me steppin' up to bat. and win or lose, just that we chose, this
little war is what kills us. and either or it's that this war is, maybe also
what thrills us. we thought we left possession behind. the truth is i was
yours and you weren't mine. i've replayed a thousand times exactly what was
said. cause nothing is as it appears. and the fun house mirrors of your fears
on a roller coaster of all these years with your hands above your head. and
win or lose, just that we chose, this little war is what kills us. and either
or it's that this war is, maybe also what thrills us. and you know i don't
care how fast you run just tell me baby that when you're done with your little
marathon that you still have cab fare home. cause the finish line is a shifty
thing and what is life with reckoning? and baby you are still the song i sing
to myself when i'm alone. and win or lose just that you chose this little war
is what kills you. and either or it's that this war is, maybe also what
thrills you.

 

[fox69]

"Recoil"

"Recoil"



Come home and my guitar
Has nothin to say to me
I recoil from all my friends
And then I'm in misery
Been so long since I've been held
Really since I was his
Probably just need to be held
That's probably all it is

Course, then I think of my dad
Who time travels mostly now
Back to when he was free
And holding out hope somehow
Who sits all day in a line
Of wheelchairs against a wall
Inventing ways to play out time
Like us all
Like us all

To all the people out there tonight
Who are comforting themselves
If you should happen to see my light
You can stop and ring my bell
I'm just sittin here in this sty
Strewn with half written songs
Taking one breath at a time
Nothin much going on
Nothin much going on

Little flashing zero
On my answering machine
Rats scratching at my brain
Brain shuffling its feet
Yes I have my father's heart
It may or may not keep on trying
Can't really tell you what it is
Keeps me this side of that dark line

But I'm not there to take care of him
And I'm not here to take care of me
I'm going outside to watch the house burn down
Across the street
I'm going outside to watch the house burn down
Across the street

To all the people out there tonight
Who are comforting themselves
If you should happen to see my light
You can stop and ring my bell
I'm just sitting here in this sty
Strewn with half written songs
Taking one breath at a time
Nothin much going on
Nothin much going on

 

[fox69]

"Red Letter Year"

"Red Letter Year"



New Year's Eve, we dropped mushrooms and danced around the house
Making music with everything that we found
Incantation replaced resolution
And we vowed to allow each perfection that we could be

And the Goddess sent word that this would be a red letter year
They didn't mention how much shit was gonna change around here
It's just as well we weren't swollen with unfocused dread
We had visions of sugarplums dancing in our heads
Dancing in our heads

Oh, first you go under and then coming up gives you bends
And when you break the surface all you see is your friends
So you grab your purple crayon and flesh out the picture behind
And finally the whole world is made of one unbroken line
One unbroken line

When you wake up sick as a dog with dull eyes and really bad hair
Standing under a lit sign with the words on air
And the water is rising, it's coming in everywhere
Just remember you are there, you're always, always there

And representing the white race a man with a monkey for a face
Is flying over in his helicopter whistling Dixie and playing dumb
In a town that might put a gun to your throat
Or rip the roof right off your place
There's a mold crawling up the walls and falling asleep in your lungs

And you and I both know how to drink so
We will always have work in this town
And besides the police are stationed at the bridge
And they're preventing passage to higher ground
So let's pull up a barstool and get ourselves a ringside seat
For one unnerving moment they're gonna show the truth on TV

 

[fox69]

"Reprieve"

"Reprieve"



Manhattan is an island
Like the women who are
Surrounded by children in the car
Surrounded by cars

Or manhattan was a project
That projected the worst of mankind
First one and then the other
Has made its mark on my mind

It's sixty years later near the hypo-center of the a-bomb
I'm standing in the middle of hiroshima
Watching a twisted old eucalyptus tree wave
One of the very few lives that survived and lives on
Remembering the day it was suddenly thousands of degrees
In the shade

And what all of nature gave birth to
Terror took in a blinding raid
With the kind of pain
It would take cancer so many years just to say

Oh to grow up gagged and blindfolded
A great big mans world in your little girls head
The voice of the great mother drowned out
In the constant honking haunting the accident scene up ahead
Oh to grow up hypnotized and then try to shake yourself awake
Cause you can sense what has been lost
Cause you can sense what is at stake

Yeah it took me a few years to catch on that those days I catch everyone's eye
Correspond with those nights of the month when the moon gleans like an egg in the sky
And men are using a sense they don't even know they have just to watch me walk by
And me, I'm supposed to be sensible, leave my animal outside to cry
But when all of nature conspires to make me her glorious whore
It's cause in my body I hold the secret recipe of precisely what life is for

And the patriarchy that looks to shame me for it is the same one making war
And I've said too much already but I'll tell you something more
To split yourself in two is just the most radical thing you can do
So girl if that shit ain't up to you, then you simply are not free
Cause from the sunlight on my hair to which eggs I grow to term
To the expression that I wear, all I really own is me

I mean to split yourself in two is just the most radical thing you can do
Goddess forbid that little adam should grow so jealous of eve
And in the face of the great farce of the nuclear age
Feminism ain't about equality, it's about reprieve

 

[fox69]

"Revelling"

"Revelling"



you were so in love
that it was all you could talk about
and i think i felt a little left out
you were on cloud 9 all the time
while i was levelling
i was wringing my hands and you were revelling

but then why shouldn't you?
it was such a beautiful thing to do

would that i could get me some
of your yum yum delirium
i could level off the ground that we stand on
but with you down on bended knee
always looking up at me
that feeling of standing up together is gone

and though i love you through all time and space
my love always seems to take second place

you were so in love
that it was all you could talk about
and i think i felt a little left out
you were on cloud 9 all the time
while i was levelling
i was wringing my hands and you were revelling

but then why shouldn't you?
it was such a beautiful thing to do

 

[fox69]

"Rock Paper Scissors"

"Rock Paper Scissors"



it's rock paper scissors as to whether i will get over you at all. it's
hand against hand and both hands are mine. it's standing in a circular line,
which is not to say that i'm not also happy. a happy meal with a surprise
inside. surprise, surprise is another bright light in my eyes, exposing all
the stuff i'm not calculating enough to hide. this melancholy that i carry
makes me feel so grown up at the kitchen table doing shots of resignation. i
never thought i'd see the day when i would i say i give up and tame the
stallions of my wildest expectations. but i do not want to know you this way,
surrounded by so much pain. but how am i supposed to let go of you this way,
like a bird into the sky of my brain? i think i could accept all these dark
colors as just part of some bigger color scheme if it wasn't for that drippy
string quartet of sadness underscoring each smiling scene. yeah desire drags
me right out of myself like a gas soaked rope tied to a piece of coal. and i'm
getting pretty good at looking at the bright side while the flames ripple on
the sand and swallow me whole. but this melancholy that i carry makes me feel
so grown up at my kitchen table doing shots of resignation. i never thought
i'd see the day when i would say i give up and break the stallions of my
wildest expectations. but i do not want to know you this way surrounded by so
much pain/ but how am i supposed to let go of you this way like a bird into
the sky of my brain.

 

[fox69]

"Rockabye"

"Rockabye"



tending the garden of noise
when I grow the traffic
and the churchbells
and the neighborhood boys
singing to myself
as the solitude sets in
in tune with the symphony
of south brooklyn
I sing

rockabye, rockabye baby
rockabye, the baby that is me
rockabye, rockabye baby
rockabye til I'm fast asleep

the tunnel is train torn
the tracks are worn and sore
I can feel the rattle
riding up through the floor
she jumped the turnstyle
he paid for his ride
I am the echo in the station
where their footfalls collide
I left her at the epicenter
we were trembling dutifully
I left him too
I left parts of me
singing rockabye...

I said today I am leaving
in every sense of the word
but I'm in love with your memory already
everything I've seen and heard
and I will go singing
as the solitude sets in
in time with the rythym
of everywhere I have been
it sounds like rockabye...

 

[fox69]

"Roll With It"

"Roll With It"



She says my ass hurts
when I sit down
she says my feet hurt
from just standing around
I think my body
is as restless as my mind
and I don't know if I can roll with it
this time

packed his uniforms
and drove him to the base
she was crying all the way
the world looked her in the face
and said
roll with it, baby
make it your career
keep the home fires burning
till america is in the clear

the mainstream is so polluted with lies
once you get wet, it's so hard to get dry
we're all taught how to justify
history
as it passes by
and it's your world
that comes crashing down
when the big boys decide
to throw their weight around
but just roll with it baby
make it your career
keep the home fires burning
till america is in the clear

what if the enemy
isn't in a distant land
what if the enemy lies behind
the voice of command
the sound of war
is a child's cry
behind tinted windows,
they just drive by
all I know is that those
who are going to be killed
aren't those who preside
on capitol hill
I told him,
don't fill the front lines
of their war
those assholes aren't worth dying for
but he said
roll with it, baby
make it your career
keep the home fires burning
till america is in the clear

she says my ass hurts
when I sit down
she says my feet hurt
from just standing around
I think my body is as restless as my mind
and I'm not gonna roll with it this time
no, I'm not gonna roll with it this time