Song Description
Driving beat, young woman follows mother's footsteps and leaves dad.
Song Length |
4:19 |
Genre |
Rock - Alternative, Rock - Indie/Low-Fi |
Tempo |
Medium (111 - 130) |
Lead Vocal |
Male Vocal |
Mood |
Tense, Incensed |
Subject |
Conformity, Femininity |
Similar Artists |
Radiohead, Velvet Underground |
Language |
English |
Era |
1990 - 1999 |
| |
Lyrics
Textbooks and applications
The absent face of my mother
Hot wind in the window
In the room a slow smother
My father offers up Cal State:
"You could leave but you shouldn't.
If she were here she would second it."
But I know she wouldn't.
We're all National Honor
He looks military
I picture father's face knotted
Like he has dysentary
Six beers and two dances pass swiftly
It's a wild night
Within four months I'm starting to show
I move to Fort Wainwright
So now I have a wedding band
Yes, with my hand
I write my future for me
But on this longest winter night
My mother's light
Shines autonomously
I've started buying meals
My daughter's in day care
My husband eyes the officers' club
But he's going nowhere
I'm working at Walden's
I am an assistant
In my mind his face is tensing
It's making me distant
By April it's obvious
I'm making better money
He thinks we'll make it on his salary
It's striking me funny
The table's turned over
I can hear the kid screaming
I'm in the car on the highway
Alone with face beaming
So now I make my place
In my own space
Like some northern sea-bird
My mother took this street
With her own feet
She walked out and upward
I've been a manager two months
It's something like probation
I can afford an apartment in Ballard
It's a kind corporation
I pull 50-hour weeks
I've come close to quitting
But I've had my fill of behavior
That smacks of wrist-slitting
A fifty-something man in my face
I give him the refund
My mother's picture on my windowsill
My mind moribund
It's in the air in this strip mall
This is foul theater
It's all too clear I'm a stooge
I'm a bottom-feeder