Alysia Harris - Paris in The Rain lyrics

Every fantasy begins in Paris Especially the recovering romantics who sits outside the mother of all cathedrals praying with the dirt and glory of a failed love enshrined beneath her fingernails Some cities look like a wet dog that's been beaten And I can say that about New Haven, if it even counts as a city And I can say that about Moscow, about Rome, about Cairo; mid-sand storm fluttering in a skirmish of red dust And even Philly with its sewers and its bridges and its rust But not Paris The grandeur of Paris is not lost, not even the rain My second night, jet lagged in heart sore I sat up writing after I awoke soaked from a dream where you made love to me Your body laid over me like an ocean trying to keep the secret of sand The waves saying to the land, that you are not gold but you belong to me, even now you belong to me And all of Paris belongs to me And I belong to this notebook and this pencil And I sat repeating this phrase Listening to the unusual weather sing its musical as it stenciled the black rain like drop pupils into the face of concrete I was reminded of the night we sat reading Baldwin and a loft not big enough for us to stand in when the rain beat its head against the roof then too I wanted to enter the downpour in my nightgown Let it drown me in the nostalgia that I am yet too young to make a mantra of Let it chase me through the cobbled streets, sleek with Parisian lights Let it find me weak with love and guillotines and truffled mushrooms And love and sauce au and subway carts And love and sidewalk cafes And did I mention love I mean Paris is the place where the lingerie shops are named Darjeeling If that doesn't make you think of sleeping next to a woman and then waking up next to that same woman and kissing her with the mouth of morning and then together making tea I don't know what does With the clouds pa**ing overhead in a parade of grey mist I waltz with my mother to Napoleon's tomb to the cheek of the Mona Through the bear trillerie garden decorated with not a single flower But I waltz with her past the bronze statue looking like a choir of bronze ghost paths The gossiping fountain and the homeless woman shouting at the top of her lungs This chair belongs to me and all the hoopla belongs to me and it did It was made for the rich but ever since it was the unspoken home for people who need to forget and to remember And I am remembering to forget you as best I can but damn it you belong to me If only in between the shoulders of September and only for the width of fall Those days spent walking downtown with you I could wrap my arms around the whole bouquet of autumn but you didn't stay Anyway we waltzed, my mother and me and when she grew tired I danced without a lovers arms or any music at all Never fearing looking like a fool Because people understood that I was American and this was Paris with its star-shaped heart With its alive with its people and with its carousels and ferris wheels and its palaces decorated with gold leaf And lollipop shaped trees and all the couples pruning each other with their kisses And all the well clad children learning that puddles are good for footprints, sketching their names in the mud Like these boots they belong to me and I belong to this Earth And everyone should fall in love in Paris if not for ever then at least once The city is so romantic You asked me how romantic I wanted to tell you that even its marble has a voice I heard it ask me why isn't he here, why isn't he kissing you My heart exploded into a champagne bottle full of tears I said because he doesn't feel the same and it said you fool Did you forget I belong to you, what are you crying for You're in Paris in the rain and the city is weeping too She's bearing her soul to you But somehow she's not one bit sad