1. "Dressed in stolen clothes she stands, cast iron and frail
With her impossibly gentle hands and blood-red fingernails"
Shades Of Scarlet Conquering, Joni Mitchell
-- The precision of a novelist and the eye of a painter create this portrait of an overwrought and needy woman. There is also a beautiful reference to "magnolias hopeful in her auburn hair."
2. "Use your mentality
Wake up to reality"
I've Got You Under My Skin, Cole Porter
-- Henry Rollins might have said it, but he didn't. Sonny Rollins has probably played it. More apt with the passing of each year, Professor Porter's wise words of philosophy.
3. "Heavy blankets . . . sweet, sad songs . . . pretty hairdos . . . sparkily rhinestones . . . I ought to know about lonely girls"
Lonely Girls, Lucinda Williams
-- Lucinda has the economy of Hank Williams (I could quote "You Win Again," but it is better just to listen to it). The lyric begins with just the expression "lonely girls" and adds one attribute per verse, until the final revelation: "I ought to know about lonely girls."
4. "She dances overhead on the ceiling near my head,
In my sight, all through the night
I try to hide in vain underneath my counterpane
But there's my love
Up there above . . ."
Dancing On The Ceiling, Lorenz Hart
-- Psychedelic, erotic, romantic, and deserving of special commendation for the use of the word counterpane.
5. ". . . With charcoal eyes and Monroe hips
She wouldn't take that California trip . . ."
Hold On, Tom Waits and Kathleen Brennan
-- An accumulation of vivid details in a tale of bruised love. Later on, there is an extraordinary passage where the obvious, final word in the third line, playing, is left out, and you hear it anyway:
". . . She closed her eyes and started swaying
But it's so hard to dance that way
When it's cold and there's no music . . ."
6. "On Raglan, on an autumn day, I met her first and knew
That her dark hair would weave a snare that I might one day rue"
Raglan Road (poem, recorded by The Dubliners and also by Van Morrison), Patrick Kavanagh
-- Words that do not necessarily require the beautiful air to which they are sung in order to create music.
7. "Jump into the wagon, love
Throw your panties overboard!
I can write you poems
Make a strong man lose his mind
I'm no pig without a wig
I hope you treat me kind
Things are breaking up out there
High Water Everywhere"
High Water (For Charley Patton), Bob Dylan
-- There are scores of Dylan songs that could be quoted in their entirety and praised for making bolder language admissible in popular music. But for the ability to surprise, the absurd humor in the face of dread, and for making the arcane come alive in the present moment, this is my choice: "Throw your panties overboard!"
--Elvis Costello
