Charles Mingus
A Colloquial Dream
[Verse 1]
Well here I am, right back where I was yesterday
And the day before, and the day before that
Sitting on a high barstool
Holding my dreams up to the sound of jazz music
I live uptown, where I don't exactly know
But I'm always downtown
And it seems I'm always with the blues
I talk to myself in public places and hum jazz tunes
I love jazz
But soon I have to make it uptown
To that old furnished room of mine
I guess that's why I stall so long downtown
But I like the cafe bars down here
Especially the ones across the street from theaters
I once wanted to be on the stage
But this is the closest I'll ever get to one
I couldn't afford a seat next to the ceiling
That was jazz music you heard blastin' out
Now I've got fifteen cents between me and starvation
And I'll probably have to walk all the way uptown
'Cause I'm playing that music again
You see, I love jazz music
[Chorus]
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo doo, doo doo
Doo doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo
That's pretty music boy
Pretty, but it ain't really pretty
It ain't like girls in magazines
[Post-Chorus]
It's beautiful
It's terribly beautiful, man
Say, like a woman you might've been with last night
Or say an hour ago
[Verse 2]
Sad huh?
Sorta reminds me of that old building I live in
My room
Looking out over Harlem's waters
Now, now catch this
Dig!
Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo doo doo doo doo
[Instrumental Break]
[Verse 3]
Now here I am standing at the window in my old building
It's night time in Harlem
I sure wish I could just relax and be cool
But it's just like my mother said
Don't cause nothing to wish Jack
Now here comes old Bob with a mouthful of jive
And I know he's comin' right here
Yeah, I hear you talkin' Jim
No company tonight, man
No, my record machine is in the pawn shop
Man, talk, stop talkin' so loud, before you wake my landlady up
And she remembers I haven't paid my rent in three weeks
Aw man, who cares?
Go, man, go
Let me be cool
Open that door!
Please let me be cool, man
I know you're in there!
Open the door!
Why don't you please stop that noise?
I know you're in there!
I want that ring!
Would you please stop all of that confusion?
Please just let me be
Please get away from my door
Would you please go?
Please be quiet
I just want to be cool, man
[Verse 4]
Man, you oughta see this old room of mine
Every morning I wake up and look around me
And I keep thinking
It must've died a hundred years during the night
And I wonder about that Jack, yes I wonder
Like how I ever got here
Because I don't have any plans of dying that fast
[Verse 5]
I guess I'm the only man in the world
Who wakes up to jazz music in the morning
Well I guess
I can't say exactly why but
I kinda find it solemn, like a hymn
You know I had to prove that to my mother when I was back home
And I woke up in the morning time digging sounds
Moms didn't dig, she just didn't go for it
Bird, Miles, and Max, she couldn't see it
Morning, afternoon, night or anytime
That is until I played her some Monk one night late
Round about midnight time
I played her some Monk
Thelonious that is
And now Moms spends many of her nights in Tunisia
[Instrumental]
[Verse 6]
Yeah, early in the morning time, late in the night time
I'm with the blues
And sometimes I'm laughing and having myself a ball
And that's why Bob keeps telling me
That the blues ain't all up there in my old room
But sometimes it dances and struts like a woman
Skips and hops like children playing ball
And maybe that's why I always manage to change once in a while
Even with the blues
And whether I like it or not, I love the idea of livin', man
And sometimes it's tough, man
And I don't mean tough like when Miles is grooving with his horn
I mean tough like when I can't make that morning meal
When I'm duckin' the landlady
When everything I have is in hock
Like when I think, when I think about all the places I haven't been
And won't ever likely get there
But I think maybe I will, yes, that's the way I think
Like the song says, the sun gonna shine in my back door someday
All the way down to the bottom of my stomach and up again
That's the way I feel
[Chorus]
Doo, doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo, doo doo doo doo doo doo
Doo doo doo
Pretty man
But not pretty
Beautiful like a woman
A real woman