Stories of the Street – English Lyrics

• By: Leonard Cohen
• Album: Songs of Leonard Cohen

Lyrics & Translation

[English]

The stories of the street are mine

The Spanish voices laugh

The Cadillacs go creeping down

Through the night and the poison gas

And I lean from my window sill

In this old hotel I chose

Yes, one hand on my suicide

One hand on the rose

I know you've heard it's over now

And war must surely come

The cities, they are broke in half

And the middle men are gone

But let me ask you one more time

Oh, children of the dust

All these hunters who are shrieking now

Oh, do they speak for us?

And where do all these highways go

Now that we are free?

Why are the armies marching still

That were coming home to me?

Oh, lady with your legs so fine

Oh, stranger at your wheel

You are locked into your suffering

And your pleasures are the seal

The age of lust is giving birth

And both the parents ask

The nurse to tell them fairy tales

On both sides of the glass

And now, the infant with his cord

Is hauled in like a kite

And one eye filled with blueprints

One eye filled with night

Oh, come with me, my little one

We will find that farm

And grow us grass and apples there

And keep all the animals warm

And if by chance I wake at night

And I ask you who I am

Oh, take me to the slaughter house

I will wait there with the lamb

With one hand on a hexagram

And one hand on a girl

I balance on a wishing well

That all men call the world

We are so small between the stars

So large against the sky

And lost among the subway crowds

I try to catch your eye