Like She Was the Last Hope Thursday, February 12, 2004

This lyric has been kicking around my head all week. Joe Henry, "Short Man's Room":

This is a short man’s room
The better-heeled watch your head
I still got my one good eye
I keep it right next to my bed
I keep all my money down here
I dressed it to look like a shoe
I’m saving up for a pair
Then I’ll have more money than you
I drink more than maybe I should
But I don’t go out when I do
I put my feet up in the window
And I ride my dreams like a canoe
Then I write letters to the newspapers
And I dance to the talk radio
I’m a volunteer fireman each Christmas
’Cause there’s brandy wherever you go
My dad was a natural tenor
He worked at the mine in Lenore
My mother was a mule-skinner
And a bandleader during the war
I once thought that I’d live forever
I pitched in the Indian Leagues
But now I guess I learned some better
You’re only as good as your knees
The better-heeled watch your head
You’re not near as tall as you’re thinking
’Cause this is a short man’s room.

I love it, particularly the bit about the Indian Leagues. I can't figure out if it's genuinely sympathetic writing, though, or just an alt-country put-on: See how much I know about average guys? Splitting hairs, but that's what we're here for.

The Secret Things, all three of them, roll on.

@ 5:43:00 PM,

1 Comments:

At 3:17 AM, Anonymous Javelina said...

OOOOHHHH thank you bless you I love you! I Googled "I write letters to the newspapers" and "short man's room" because I was totally stuck for the rest of that verse. I recorded T-Bone Burnett off the radio in about 1991 singing this and listened to it for years, and now I can't find the tape. In my view it's a sympathetic but realistic picture of one of those guys that comes up and starts talking to you in the laundromat... And as I hear it, it's "Better you watch your head" (as in, You'd better watch...). And there's a line missing, the second line of the last verse:

So better you watch your head
A guy like you
You're not near as tall as you're thinkin'
But then, this is a short man's room.

T-Bone's not the one who wrote it (I thought he was) -- you'll find the guy if you Google Short Man's Room -- some younger guy who bought the farm, if I'm not mistaken. Gonna go look.

 

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