Natalie Merchant: Live

Wonder

Doctors have come
from distant cities
just to see me
stand over my bed
disbelieving what they're seeing

they say I must be one of the wonders
of god's own creation
and as far as the can see they can offer
no explanation

newspapers ask
intimate questions
what confessions
they reach into my head
to steal the glory
of my story

they say I must be one of the wonders
of god's own creation
and as far as the can see they can offer
no explanation

I believe
fate smiled and destiny
laughed as she came to my cradle
"know this child will be able"
laughed as my body she lifted
"know this child will be gifted
with love, with patience
and with faith
she'll make her way"

people see me
I'm a challenge
to your balance
I'm over your heads
how I confound you
and astound you
to know I must be one of the wonders
of god's own creation
and as far as you can see you can offer me
no explanation

I believe
fate smiled and destiny
laughed as she came to my cradle
"know this child will be able"
laughed as she came to my mother
"know this child will not suffer"
laughed as my body she lifted
"know this child will be gifted
with love, with patience
and with faith
she'll make her way"

San Andreas Fault

Go west
paradise is there
you'll have all that you can eat
of milk and honey over there

you'll be the brightest star
the world has ever seen
sun-baked slender heroine
of film and magazine

go west
paradise is there
you'll have all that you can eat
of milk and honey over there

you'll be the brightest light
the world has ever seen
the dizzy height of a jet-set life
you could never dream

your pale blue eyes
strawberry hair
lips so sweet
skin so fair

your future bright
beyond compare
it's rags to riches
over there

San Andreas Fault
moved it's fingers
through the ground
earth divided
plates collided
such an awful sound

San Andreas Fault
moved its fingers
through the ground
terra cotta shattered
and walls came
tumbling down

o promised land
o wicked ground
build a dream
tear it down

o promised land
what a wicked ground
build a dream
watch it fall down

Beloved Wife

You were the love
for certain of my life
you were simply my beloved wife
I don't know for certain
how I'll live my life
now alone without my beloved wife
my beloved wife

I can't believe
I've lost the very best of me

you were the love
for certain of my life
you were simply my beloved wife
I don't know for certain
how I'll live my life
now alone without my beloved wife
my beloved wife

I can't believe
I've lost the very best of me

you were the love
for certain of my life
for 50 years simply my beloved wife
with another love I'll never lye again
it's you I can't deny
it's you I can't defy
a depth so deep
into my grief
without my beloved soul
I renounce my life
as my right
now alone without my beloved wife
my beloved wife

my beloved wife
my love is gone she suffered long
in hours of pain
my love is gone
now my suffering begins
my love is gone
would it be wrong if I should
surrender all the joy in my life
go with her tonight?

my love is gone she suffered long
in hours of pain
my love is gone
would it be wrong if I should
just turn my face away from the light
go with her tonight?

Space Oddity

Ground Control to Major Tom
Ground Control to Major Tom
Take your protein pills and put your helmet on

Ground Control to Major Tom
Commencing countdown, engines on
Check ignition and may God's love be with you

(spoken)
Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six, Five, Four, Three, Two, One, Liftoff

This is Ground Control to Major Tom
You've really made the grade
And the papers want to know whose shirts you wear
Now it's time to leave the capsule if you dare

"This is Major Tom to Ground Control
I'm stepping through the door
And I'm floating in a most peculiar way
And the stars look very different today

For here
Am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world
Planet Earth is blue
And there's nothing I can do

Though I'm past one hundred thousand miles
I'm feeling very still And I think my spaceship knows which way to go
Tell my wife I love her very much she knows"

"Here am I floating round my tin can
Far above the Moon
Planet Earth is blue
And there's nothing I can do."

Carnival

I've walked these streets
a virtual stage
it seemed to me
make up on their faces
actors took their
places next to me

I've walked these streets
in a carnival
of sights to see
all the cheap thrill seekers
the vendors and the dealers
they crowded around me

have I been blind
have I been lost
inside my self and
my own mind
hypnotized
mesmerized
by what my eyes have seen?

I've walked these streets
in a spectacle of wealth and poverty
in the diamond markets
the scarlet welcome carpet
that they just rolled out for me

I've walked these streets
in the mad house asylum
they can be
where a wild eyed misfit prophet
on a traffic island stopped
and he raved of saving me

have I been blind
have I been lost
inside my self and
my own mind
hypnotized
mesmerized
by what my eyes have seen?

have I been wrong
have I been wise
to shut my eyes
and play along
hypnotized
paralyzed
by what my eyes have found
by what my eyes have seen
what they have seen?

have I been blind
have I been lost
inside my self and
my own mind
hypnotized
mesmerized
by what my eyes have found
in that great street carnival
in that carnival?

Dust Bowl

����� I should know to leave them home. They follow me through the store with these toys I can't afford. "Kids, take them back, you know better than that." Dolls that talk, astronauts, T.V. games, airplanes, they don't understand and how can I explain? I try and try but I can't save. Pennies, nickels, dollars slip away. I've tried and tried but I can't save.
����� My youngest girl has bad fever, sure. All night with alcohol to cool and rub her down. Ruby, I'm tired, try and get some sleep. I'm adding doctor's fees to remedies with the cost of three day's work lost. I try and try but I can't save. Pennies, nickels, dollars slip away. I've tried and tried but I can't save. The hole in my pocketbook is growing.
����� There's a new wind blowing they say, it's gonna be a cold, cold one. So brace yourselves my darlings, it won't bring anything much our way but more dust bowl days.
����� I played a card in this weeks game. Took the first and the last letters in three of their names. This lottery's been building up for weeks. I could be lucky me with the five million prize, tears of disbelief spilling out of my eyes. I try and try but I can't save. Pennies, nickels, dollars slip away. I've tried and tried but I can't save. The hole in my pocketbook is growing.
����� There's a new wind blowing they say, it's gonna be a cold, cold one. So brace yourselves my darlings, it won't bring anything much our way but more dust bowl days.

After The Gold Rush

Well, I dreamed I saw the knights
In armor coming,
Saying something about a queen.
There were peasants singing and
Drummers drumming
And the archer split the tree.
There was a fanfare blowing
To the sun
That was floating on the breeze.
Look at Mother Nature on the run
In the nineteen seventies.
Look at Mother Nature on the run
In the nineteen seventies.
I was lying in a burned out basement
With the full moon in my eyes.
I was hoping for replacement
When the sun burst thru the sky.
There was a band playing in my head
And I felt like getting high.
I was thinking about what a
Friend had said
I was hoping it was a lie.
Thinking about what a
Friend had said
I was hoping it was a lie.

Well, I dreamed I saw the silver
Space ships flying
In the yellow haze of the sun,
There were children crying
And colors flying
All around the chosen ones.
All in a dream, all in a dream
The loading had begun.
They were flying Mother Nature's
Silver seed to a new home in the sun.
Flying Mother Nature's
Silver seed to a new home.

Gun Shy

����� I always knew that you would take yourself far from home as soon as, as far as you could go. By the 1/4 inch cut of your hair and the Army issue green, for the past eight weeks I can tell where you've been. For I knew, I could see, it was all cut and dried to me there was soldier's blue blood streaming inside your veins. There is a world outside of this room and when you meet it promise me you won't meet it with your gun.
����� So now you are one of the brave few, it's awful sad we need boys like you. I hope the day never comes for "Here's your live round son. Stock and barrel, safety, trigger, here's your gun." Well I knew, I could see, it was all cut and dried to me there was soldiers blue blood streaming inside your veins. There is a world outside of this room and when you meet it promise me you won't meet it with your gun taking aim. For I don't mean to argue, they've made a decent boy of you and I don't mean to spoil your home coming, but baby brother you should expect me to.
����� "Stock and barrel, safety, trigger, here's your gun." So now does your heart pitter pat with a patriotic song when you see the stripes of Old Glory waving? Well I knew, I could see, it was all cut and dried to me there was soldier's blue blood streaming inside your veins. There is a world outside of this room and when you meet it promise me you won't meet it with your gun taking aim. I don't mean to argue, they've made a decent boy of you and I don't mean to spoil your homecoming my baby brother Jude and I don't mean to hurt you by saying this again, they're so good at making soldiers but they're not so good at making men.

Gulf Of Araby

(Written by Katell Keineg)

If you could fill a veil with shells from Killiney's shore
and sweet talk in a tongue that is no more
If wishful thought could bridge
The Gulf Of Araby
Between what is, what is, what is
And what can never be

If you could hold the frozen flow of New Hope Creek
And hide out from the one they said you might meet
If you could unlearn all the words
That you never wanted heard
If you could stall the southern wind
That's whistling in your ear
You could take what is, what is, what is
To what can never be

One man of sventy whispers free at last
Two neighbors who are proud of their massacres
Three tyrants torn away in a winter's month
Four prisoners framed by a dirty judge
Five burned with tyres
Six men still alive
And seven more days to shake at the great divide

We would plough and part the earth to bring you home
We would harvest every miracle ever known
If they laid out all the things
That these ten years want to bring
We would gladly give them up
To bring you back to us
O, there is nothing wewould not give
To kiss you and believe we can take what is, what is, what is
To what can never be

One man of seventy whispers not free yet
Two neighbors who make up knee-deep in their dead
Three tyrants torn away in the summer's heat
Four prisoners lost in the fallacy
Five, on my life
Six, I'm dead inside
And seven more days to shake at the great divide
The Gulf Of Araby

Ophelia

Ophelia was a bride of God
A novice Carmelite,
In sister cells, the cloister bells,
tolled on her wedding night
Ophelia was the rebel girl,
A blue-stockinged suffragette
Who remedied society between her cigarettes
And Ophelia was the sweetheart to a nation overnight
Curvaceous thighs, vivacious eyes
Love was at first sight,
Love was at first sight, love
Ophelia was a demi-goddess
In pre-war Babylon
So statuesque, a silhouette
In black, satin evening gowns
Ophelia was the mistress to a Vegas gambling man
Signora Ophelia Maraschina
Mafia courtesan
Ophelia was the circus queen, the female cannonball
Projected through five flaming hoops
To wild and shocked applause
To wild and shocked applause
Hey, he-he-he-he-hey,
Ophelia was a tempest, cyclone, a god-damned hurricane
Your common sense, your best defense lay wasted and in vain
For Ophelia'd know your every woe and every pain you'd ever have
She'd sympathize and dry your eyes
Help you to forget
And help you to forget
And help you to forget
Ophelia's mind went wandering
You'd wonder where she'd gone
To secret doors down corridors
She'd wander them alone
All alone

Seven Years

How did I love you?
there was no measuring
far above this dirty world
far above everything
in your tower over it
you were clean

so warm and insightful
were you in my eyes
I was sure the rightful
guardian of my life
damn you betrayer
how you lied

but for seven years
you were loved
I laid golden orchid crowns
around your feet

for seven years
I bowed down
to touch the ground
so wholly your devotee

you were
all I could see

I've got my sight now
I see everything you hid
so don't you try to right now
all the wrong you did
I might forget you
but never forgive

but for seven years
you were loved
I laid golden orchid crowns
around your feet

for seven years
I bowed down
to touch the ground
so wholly your devotee

for seven years
you were so revered
I made offerings of
anything and everything I had

you were
all I could see