She walks alone down a sleazy backstreet
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Around a corner, up an alley to a dead end
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There under a small blue light
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She enters an unmarked doorway
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(A low heartbeat, a low pounding escapes into the night)
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This is a place she goes to fulfill a very basic need
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Something people have been doing since the dawn of man
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To communicate without talking
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If she needs something
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She makes a gesture with her hand
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And mouths what she wants
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She wants to make a connection
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A certain kind of connection
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No this is not about something from the black market
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This is about no questions
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This is about smoke and sweat and beats
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This is about no message
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CHORUS:
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Take your partner by the hand
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He's a woman, she's a man
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What's so hard to understand
|
Take your partner by the hand
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Mona in the promised land
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Take your partner by the hand
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Keep it simple if you can
|
Take your partner by the hand
|
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At the club they circle around some sex goddess like vultures
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Flashbulbs popping
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Like bees around their queen
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She is completely indifferent to all the commotion
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And orders some mango tango ice cream by sign language
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She's approached by some wild-eyed poet drunk with love
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I like her easy refusal, the way she shakes her head
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She lives these days in the attic of an old dance hall
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That's been shut down for years
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And swears there's times when she can hear feet shuffling below
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And can see the shadows swaying, moving to the music
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CHORUS (first half)
|
|
Elevator going up
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Fifth floor
|
Lady's handbags, shoes, leather accessories, and electronics
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Wait a minute, where am I, on this elevator to nowhere
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Going up, going down
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Then like a hallucination
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I saw her out of the corner of my eye
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Studying some shoes very carefully
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She definitely had a particular purpose for these shoes in mind
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Then as quickly as she appeared, she disappeared
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Back into the slash and burn of New York
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Ah, stuck in traffic
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Crosstown, the stress of not moving
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She described it as like being locked in a car
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With a madman behind the wheel
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And the radio tuned to static
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CHORUS
|
|
-----------------
|
Take Your Partner by the Hand
|
| The Band |
