Hotel Universe - Class

Selected lyrics

Killed our president

sung: I guess it’s that time again, I guess it’s the season:
They’re coming after me, don’t need no reason.
I asked a wise man, what is a dream?
He said it’s feeling things you don’t know what they mean.
I asked a wise man where does he sleep?
Down at the widening where the river ain’t as deep,
the dreams creep out the shallows and nestle in your brain.
They come back after seven years to haunt you once again,
At the window in the rain, still watching St. Patrick’s parade.
They killed our president, put him in his grave. 
But for us: when will we have our day?
I saw the wise man the other day,
bright green river dye all up in his grey.
I guess it’s that time again; the kids are burning. 
Kerosene on blankets, have you tossing and turning.
They go back to their parents, to their apartments,
to their high schools, their history departments.
They hear about the Indians, the Whites and the Blacks,
and they wonder where they fit in to all of that.
At the window in the rain, still watching St. Patrick’s parade.
They put our president in his grave. 
But for us: when will we have our day?

spoken: I am a witness to things beyond my comprehension, despite my education, or perhaps because of it. Like the man collapsed on the ground at Ashmont station, near the escalator, who, when poked by a police officer saying “wake up! Wake up!” in his cop-voice, says indignantly, in a moment of violent conciousness from the ground, “don’t do that. I’m not a bum, I’m a veteran”.

May ’68

According to an eyewitness account of the May ’68 revolution in Paris, an encounter took place between factory workers on strike occupying their factory, and a delegation of students sent to express solidarity with the workers. They all chanted “les usines aux ouvriers”- the factories to the workers, an old communist slogan. The workers then countered with “la Sorbonne aux etudiants”- the Sorbonne to the students, showing them support for the students effort at establishing open, empowered, student-directed education. Then the students countered with something unexpected-

“La Sorbonne aux ouvriers”

the Sorbonne to the workers.

And this chant was upheld by all for a couple of pleased, amused, idealistic rounds.

But why, one must ask in retrospect, why was it untenable, utopian, almost a joke? And a joke on whom? – the workers in question, or the students who dared to say it aloud?  What would it have taken for it to be a serious proposition?-

After all, someone must man the factories, and if the workers are at la Sorbonne with the students, who will do it?

We must ask also, why were there no counter cries of “les usines aux etudiants”- the factories to the students?

 And what does that omission teach? What would such a call mean, and what can be implied from it’s notable absence?

Why would the students not want to be part of the process of production at this level?

Cambridgetown

One day we gonna walk across that bridge.
We gonna walk across that bridge to Cambridgetown.
And on that day it won’t matter if you smart, or if you rich,
cause on that day the walls are coming down.
We’re gonna be working, we’ll all be working, we’re gonna be working,
the whole night through.e this hammer,
you know what to do.
All my life I lived down on Washington.
Kids on Washington still running free.
All my life and I ain’t never hurt no one.
I ain’t even cut no cherry tree.
I been working, we’ll all be working, we’re gonna be working,
the whole night through.
Take my hand, sir, I ain’t got no answers, just take this hammer,
daddy, you know what to do.
Do you know who’s on your side?
One day we’re gonna walk across that bridge,
we’re gonna walk across that bridge to Cambridgetown.

In the Dark

All these businessmen have crushes on the girls that serve them coffee,
yeah they wonder what it’s like to do a woman with short hair,
and they try to tip them well, but the change never comes out right,
and they wonder where she lives, and if the walls are painted bright,
but in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark
it’s all the same to me now.
Yeah I used to be a picker, cause you see so many girls,
and you try to find that one, with the light behind her eyes,
but they all drink their coffee, and they all drink their beer,
and they all paint their bedrooms the color of their eyes,
but in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark it’s all the same to me now.

We all wait in April.
We all wait in May.
We all wait for tomorrow.
We all wait, wait today.

Every morning on the train I used to see this girl,
once I tried to talk to her but she couldn’t hear a thing,
and then all the lights went out, and the rattling went on.
By the time that I could see again her stop had come and gone,
but in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark
it’s all the same to me now.
When I see them on the train, with their hands on that bar,
with the watches on their wrists, and the sleeves of their suits,
and their hands on their cups, and the links in their cuffs,
I want to get up in their face, I couldn’t yell it

Take my hand, sir, I ain’t got no answers, just takloud enough,
in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark it’s all the same, in the dark it’sall the same to me now.

We all wait in April.
We all wait in May.
We all wait for tomorrow.
We all wait, wait today.

The Stutterer

This is Ben’s favorite Torah portion. Out of the whole year, when he hears the rabbi speak on Va’era he feels, for a moment, not just equal to everyone else, but actually he feels superior to all the others in the pews. He is preferred to the women nodding in their makeup faces, wearing neat blouses, pressed skirts or slacks, the men in kippot conspicuously thinking, not about having been slaves in Egypt, but about what a killer job they did roping that client into the contract extension yesterday. When he hears the story of Moses’ objection to G-d that he can not  speak to Pharoah or lead the isrealites to freedom because he is a stutterer- the Rabbi says he may also be deformed. It may be because his mother is also his father’s aunt- but that G-d rejects the stigma that other humans have put on Moses, Ben feels personally vindicated. He turns his large, mostly bald head where it sits on his large unwieldy (his mother says “dumpy”) body, and surveys the beautiful jews around him- all the PHDs, all the perfect children, including his sister and hers, and for once he feels that they are below him, not just because he is physically large-abnormally so, since childhood- but because G-d chose the stutterer.