Townes Van Zandt – Sad cinderella

by Townes Van Zandt

When the bandits have stolen your jewelry and gone

and your crippled young gypsy, he’s grown tall and strong

and your dead misconceptions have proven you wrong

well then, princess, where you plannin’ to turn to?

when your magazine memory has spun you around

and you realize your lovers were just painted clowns

and outside your window you start hearing sounds

where they’re building a cross for to burn you

when all your bright scarlet turn slowly to blue

will you stop and decide that it’s over?

When your teardrops go sour and no longer fall

the splash cross the virgin that lives down your hall

and spends all her nights with an ear to your wall

well then, what will you have you can offer?

When the firedancers finish and leave you alone

with nothing but embers and sacks full of stone

that hang round your neck, slicing through to the bone

will there still be place for your laughter?

As your shattered illusions come a-tumblin’ home

and all of the butchers you’ve nourished have grown

and they are suddenly able to leave you alone

and they run like slaves that are set free

when your questions are answered and your pleading is done

and your mind starts to screaming that you ain’t the one

that once dwelled within you, will you turn, will you run

Then princess, will you come home and get me?