Pushing thru the market square So many mothers sighing News had just come over We had five years left to cry in
News guy wept and told us He said 'earth was really dying' Cried so much his face was wet Then I knew he was not lying
I heard telephones, opera house, favourite melodies There were boys, toys electric irons and T. V. 's My brain hurt like a warehouse, it had no room to spare I had to cram so many things to store everything in there
And all the fat-skinny people And all the tall-short people And all the nobody people And all the somebody people Never thought I'd need so many people
A girl my age went off her head Hit some tiny children If the black hadn't a-pulled her off And I think she would have killed them
A soldier with a broken armfixed His stare to the wheels of a Cadillac A cop knelt and kissed the feet of a priest And a queer threw up at the sight of that
Well, I think I saw you in an ice-cream parlour Drinking milk shakes cold and long Smiling and waving and looking so fine Don't think you knew you were in this song
And it was cold and it rained so I felt like an actor And I thought of Ma and I wanted to get back there Your face, your race, the way that you talk I miss you, you're beautiful
We've got five years, stuck on my eyes Five years, what a surprise We've got five years, my brain hurts a lot Five years, that's all we've got We've got Five years.