Eleven

Eleven years old when janis joplin died

It was a time in her life full of feminine pride

A wrinkle in time and the wind in the willows

Hiding behind the summer clothes that billowed

On the line

With a head full of music and playful heart

With her two best friends you couldn't tear them apart

Reading notes and measures and harriet the spy

King of the mountain and a big blue sky

So open wide

Running like a girl

You go sailing past my window chased by tracers of the sun

Running like a girl

Meet me in the underbrush remember solid ground we touched

In our forested fortresses

Growing up fast on the edge of a storm

There was a peace to keep, a job to perform

Learning well how to settle into so polite

Quietly there by a tv light

So close inside

Proud and stoic with a sense of duty

No one there to notice her developing beauty

If they could have listened there was no mistaking

The dissonent sound of a young heart breaking

Open wide

Watching girlfriends lining up one by one

To pledge allegiance to the women they would soon become

They all quit sports and got a d in math

And you began to follow a narrow path

Once open wide

Running like a girl

You go sailing past my window blazing trails against the wind

Out into this world

Finding out about your difference i will give you love's assistance

Now that i am aware of you

I was stranded outside and i couldn't speak

Needed a soothing brain balm just to get through the week

I was feeling amputated from my neck to my shoes

And the gulf between my voice and my heart was ooh

So far and wide

When i woke from this dream i was thinking of you

How you've always known just what to do

With your skinny brown legs and your face to the sun

Nothing you've known has ever come undone

Heart open wide

Running like a girl

Tearing up my neighborhood under a big blue sky

Running like a girl

Meet me in the underbrush remember solid ground we touched