Funeral Row
(V. Ferrara/S. Kallaugher)
Whispered voices
red-rimmed eyes
cigarette butts
children’s cries
mansions of mourning
temples to the gone
no stars at night
no sunlight at dawn

CHORUS
Still as a statue
black as a crow
the street I grew up on
funeral row

I’d sit by the window
watching priests and limousines
I’d wake at night in my bed screaming
from skulls in my dreams
my mother said play quiet
and say a little prayer
for that one, he died yesterday
and nobody cared

CHORUS

I went back once for my mother
and once more for my dad
I buried everything I ever loved
I gave away everything I ever had

So I live now on another street
but it all looks the same
but no one here needs my prayers
and no one knows my name

I like it like that
I like it a lot like that

We wrote this the day after seeing PiL’s first American show. It’s based on the fact that our rehearsal studio was surrounded by funeral homes. The local teens — the Stepkids — would sit on the stairs and listen to us rehearse, and we wondered what it would be like to grow up around such constant reminders of death.