Why is it that as we grow older and stronger
|
The road signs point us adrift and make us afraid
|
Saying, 'You never can win'
|
'Watch your back', 'Where's your husband?'
|
I don't like the signs that the signmakers made
|
|
So I'm going to steal out with my paint and brushes
|
I'll change the directions, I'll hit every street
|
It's the Tinseltown scandal, the robin hood vandal
|
She goes out and steals the king's English
|
And in the morning you wake up and the signs point to you
|
|
They say, "I'm so glad that you finally made it here
|
You thought nobody cared but I did, I could tell
|
And this is your year and it always starts here
|
And oh, you're aging well"
|
|
Well I know a woman with a collection of sticks
|
She could fight back the hundreds of voices she heard
|
She could poke at the greed, she could fend off her need
|
And with anger she found she could pound every word
|
|
But one voice got through, caught her up by surprise
|
It said, "Don't hold us back we're the story you tell"
|
And no sooner than spoken, a spell had been broken
|
And the voices before her were trumpets and tympani
|
Violins, basses and woodwinds and cellos, singing
|
|
"We're so glad that you finally made it here
|
You thought nobody cared, but we did, we could tell
|
And now you'll dance through the days while the orchestra plays
|
And oh, you're aging well"
|
|
Now when I was fifteen, oh I knew it was over
|
The road to enchantment was not mine to take
|
'Cause lower calf, upper arm should be half what they are
|
I was breaking the laws that the signmakers made
|
|
And all I could eat was the poisonous apple
|
And that's not a story I was meant to survive
|
I was all out of choices but the woman of voices
|
She turned round the corner with music around her
|
She gave me the language that keeps me alive, she said
|
|
"I'm so glad that you finally made it here
|
With the things you know now, that only time could tell
|
Looking back, seeing far, landing right where we are
|
And oh, you're aging, oh and I am aging oh, aren't we aging well?"
|
|
-----------------
|
You're Aging Well
|
| Joan Baez |
