My mother danced in bars
Imitating Jean Harlow
My father threw daggers
At the circus in Buffalo
Then one day, I was told "go west"
And I pedaled
From New York to Los Angeles
On a stolen bike

So, I wore out my elbows
Rubbing counters
With a Hollywood star
Who was losing her memory
Along Sunset Boulevard
Arm in arm
We lost our last dollars
In the slot machines

One day, Benjamin Shankar
The cousin or the brother
Of the guy who plays the sitar
At the court of England
Won the right in a dice game
To be her lover for a year
We went to live as three
In his apartment

She brought back travelers
Shy high school students
Who could make two dollars an hour
Some Polaroids
She put us in the kitchen
So we wouldn't watch
In a month, we played all of Gershwin
On mustard glasses

We did music-hall
Dressed as Hindus
She danced in a baby-doll
On Rhapsody in Blue
She ended up under the hood
Of a Dodge or Cadillac
I picked up her hat
The other took her bag

Then he continued
His life as a wandering Hindu
I went back
To live with my parents
My mother was becoming too ugly
To play Jean Harlow
My father had killed his assistant
At the circus in Buffalo

La la, la la la la, la la la la la la
La la, la la la la, la la la la la la

VIEW ORIGINAL LYRICS