Slid out of my dreams like a baby out of the nurse's hands   onto the hard floor of day   I'd been wearing OJ's gloves and I couldn't get them off   It was too early but I couldn't sleep   showered, dressed, stepped out into the heat   the parrot things on the porch next door   announced my arrival on Chartres Street   with their finest rendition of squealing brakes   Down in Kaldi's café the newspaper headlines promised new revelations   about Prince Charles' Amex account   A morose youth in old-time Austrian drag stares past his moustache at the ground   and last night's punks and fetish kids all tattoos and metal bits   and in the other corner (wearing the white trunks)   today's tourists already sweating      Deep in the city of the saints and fools   Pearls before pigs and dung become jewels   I sit down with tigers and sit down with lambs   None of them know who exactly I am      I've got this thing in my heart   I must give it today   It only lives when you give it away      Languid mandala of the ceiling fan   teases the air like a slow stroking hand   Study the faces, study the cards   Study the shadow creeping over the yard      I've got this thing in my heart   I must give it today   It only lives when you give it away      Trouble with nations, trouble with relations   Where you gonna go for some illumination?   Too much to carry too much to let go   Time goes fast learning goes slow      I've got this thing in my heart   I must give it today   It only lives when you give it away