Lyrics Mother England Reverie - Jethro Tull

Mother England Reverie

Minstrel In The Gallery
Mother England Reverie
I have no time for Time Magazine or Rolling Stone.
I have no wish for wishing wells or wishing bones.
I have no house in the country I have no motor car.
And if you think I’m joking, then I’m just a one-line
joker in a public bar.
And it seems there’s no-body left for tennis; and I’m
a one-band-man.
And I want no Top Twenty funeral or a hundred grand.
There was a little boy stood on a burning log,
rubbing his hands with glee. He said, ``Oh Mother England,
did you light my smile; or did you light
this fire under me?
One day I’ll be a minstrel in the gallery.
And paint you a picture of the queen.
And if sometimes I sing to a cynical degree ---
it’s just the nonsense that it seems.''
So I drift down through the Baker Street valley,
in my steep-sided un-reality.
And when all is said and all is done --- I couldn’t wish
for a better one.
It’s a real-life ripe dead certainty ---
that I’m just a Baker Street Muse.
Talking to the gutter-stinking, winking in the same
old way.
I tried to catch my eye but I looked the other way.
Indian restaurants that curry my brain ---
newspaper warriors changing the names they
advertise from the station stand.
Circumcised with cold print hands.
Windy bus-stop. Click. Shop-window. Heel.
Shady gentleman. Fly-button. Feel.
In the underpass, the blind man stands.
With cold flute hands.
Symphony match-seller, breath out of time ---
you can call me on another line.
Didn’t make her --- with my Baker Street Ruse.
Couldn’t shake her --- with my Baker Street Bruise.
Like to take her --- but I’m just a Baker Street Muse.
(I can’t get out!)