Rehearsal - King Derio

Many a hand has scaled the grand old face of the plateau Some belong to strangers, and some to folks you know Holy ghosts and talk show hosts are planted in the sand To beautify the foothills, and shake the many hands Nothing on the top but a bucket and a mop And an illustrated book about birds You see a lot up there but don't be scared Who needs action when you got words When you've finished with the mop, then you can stop And look at what you've done The plateau's clean, no dirt to be seen And the work, it was fun Nothing on the top but a bucket and a mop And an illustrated book about birds You see a lot up there but don't be scared Who needs action when you got words Many hands began to scan around for the next plateau Some say it was Greenland, some say Mexico Others decided it was nowhere except for where they stood But those were all just guesses Wouldn't help you if they could

Four o'clock in the afternoon and I didn't feel like very much I said to myself, "Where are you, golden boy? Where's your famous golden touch?" I thought you knew where all of the elephants lie down I thought you were the crown prince of all the wheels in Ivory Town Just take a look at your body now, there's nothing much to save And a bitter voice in the mirror cries, "Hey, prince, you need a shave" Now if you can manage to get your trembling fingers to behave Why don't you try unwrapping a stainless steel razor blade? That's right, it's come to this Yes, it's come to this And wasn't it a long way down? Wasn't it a strange way down? There's no hot water and the cold is running thin Well, what do you expect from the kind of places you've been living in? Don't drink from that cup, it's all caked and cracked along the rim That's not the electric light, my friend, that is your vision growing dim Cover up your face with soap there, now you're Santa Claus And you've got a gift for anyone who will give you his applause I thought you were a racing man, oh, but you couldn't take the pace That's a funeral in the mirror and it's stopping at your face That's right, it's come to this Yes, it's come to this And wasn't it a long way down? Ah, wasn't it a strange way down? Once there was a path and a girl with chestnut hair And you passed the summers picking all of the berries that grew there There were times she was a woman, oh, there were times she was just a child And you held her in the shadows where the raspberries grow wild And you climbed the twilight mountains and you sang about the view And everywhere that you wandered, love seemed to go along with you That's a hard one to remember, yes, it makes you clench your fist And then the veins stand out like highways, all along your wrist And yes, it's come to this It's come to this And wasn't it a long way down? Wasn't it a strange way down? You can still find a job, go out and talk to a friend On the back of every magazine, there are those coupons you can send Why don't you join the Rosicrucians, they will give you back your hope You can find your love with diagrams on a plain brown envelope But you've used up all your coupons except the one that seems To be written on your wrist along with several thousand dreams Now Santa Claus comes forward, that's a razor in his mitt And he puts on his dark glasses and he shows you where to hit And then the cameras pan The stand-in stunt man Dress rehearsal rag It's just the dress rehearsal rag You know, this dress rehearsal rag It's just the dress rehearsal rag