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Copyright © 2008 Porch String Music - All rights reserved.

8. Shamu

by Nancy Rost

(c) 2006 Sesquipedalian Publishing ASCAP

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Nancy: piano, vocals

Tracy: cello

Dave: backing vocals

What are you doing out on the runway

Gleaming black in the sun?

You taxi slowly, as if underwater

Dreading the job to be done

Jonahs dabbed with ambergris

Tap their shoes impatiently

And you spin, and you spin, trying to rise

Shamu, I, too, feel like a fish out of water

Shamu, Shamu, we are aliens

Shamu, Shamu, I feel for you

But what can we do?

Communication should happen in murmurs

Not all this high-pitched chatter

There are too many words

And not enough that matter

But you were in the biz so long

You know the damn show must go on

And you spin, and you spin, trying to rise

Shamu, I, too, feel like a fish out of water

Shamu, Shamu, we are aliens

Shamu, Shamu, I feel for you

But what can we do?

Sweat and tears are underrated

Salt is all that we crave

We splash and we are elated

Riding wave after wave after wave ...

But you must set all that aside

Ride the waves up in the sky

And you spin, and you spin, trying to rise

Shamu, I, too, feel like a fish out of water

Shamu, Shamu, we are aliens

Shamu, Shamu, I feel for you

But what can we do?

But what can we do?

But what can we do?

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Notes: “Shamu” and “Golden Gate” (track #2) were written during February Album Writing Month (www.fawm.org). Special thanks to Eric Distad, Joel D Canfield, Jeffrey Marsh and Barbara Laurent for helping me to refine these songs.