The Sondheim Lyrics Chain

[KathyB]

One has regrets
Which one forgets,
And as the years go on,
The road you didn't take
Hardly comes to mind,
Does it?
The door you didn't try,
Where could it have led?
The choice you didn't make
Never was defined,
Was it?
Dreams you didn't dare
Are dead.
Were they ever there?
Who said?


I almost went with "hardly" and then I realized how many times SJS uses that word just in A Little Night Music. It's probably used as often as "miracle."

[scenicdesign71]

He'd never... therefore they haven't...
Which makes the question absolutely... could she?
She daren't... therefore I mustn't...
What utter rot!

Fidelity is more than mere display,
It's what a man expects from life:
Fidelity, like mine to Desirée
And Charlotte, my devoted wife.

[KathyB]

To see them—indiscriminate
Women, it
Pains me more than I can say,
The lack of taste that they display.

Where is style?
Where is skill?
Where is forethought?
Where's discretion of the heart,
Where's passion in the art,
Where's craft?

[scenicdesign71]

She wasn't no match for such craft, you see,
And everyone thought it so droll!
They figured she had to be daft, you see,
So all of them stood there and laughed, you see—
Poor soul!
Poor thing!

[KathyB]

Perpetual anticipation is
Good for the soul
But it's bad for the heart.
It's good for practicing self-control.
It's very good for morals
But bad for morale.

[scenicdesign71]

The British feel these latest deal-
     ings verge on immorality.
The element of precedent
     imperils our neutrality!
We're rather vexed you're giving ext-
     raterritoriality—
We must insist you offer this t-
     o every nationality.

[KathyB]

If she'd only been willful...
If she'd only have fled...
Or a little less skillful...
Insulted, insisting...
In bed...

[scenicdesign71]

The bread, George.
I mean, the bread, George.
And then in bed, George...
I mean, he kneads me.
I mean, like dough, George.
Hello, George...?


Apparently painters aren't the only ones prone to objectifying their partners, even unconsciously, as mere accessories to their creative calling — to an artist, everyone's a model; to a baker, everything's dough?  But then again, as the lady says: the bread...  We should all have such agonizing choices, but despite "Everybody Loves Louis"'s charm and humor, one does feel the acute bind she's in, and it's not just an abstract emotional question of true love versus second-best expedience.

[KathyB]

Eating in a greasy spoon
To save on my dough.
At
My tiny flat,
There's just my cat,
A bed and a chair.
Still,
I'll stick it till
I'm on a bill
All over Times Square.

[scenicdesign71]

Saw Bill McKinley there in the sun.
Heard Bill McKinley say, "Folks, have fun!
Some men have everything and some have none—
But that's just fine!
In the U.S.A., you can work your way
To the head of the line!"

If I were a pedant, I might point out that "some men have everything and some have none" suggests a parallelism it doesn't deliver, swerving from the syntax of everything/nothing to that of all/none for the sake of a rhyme which is thereby rendered just a mite awkward, if you ill-advisedly stop to think about it.  Then again, if I were a pedant, I might also idiotically complain that the first two lines are fragments, built on verbs with no subjects.  The Balladeer sings throughout in a unique idiolect that successfully combines Sondheimian fluency and crispness with the kind of studied folk-Americana "simplicity" that had SJS self-consciously droppin' his g's as a teenager.

[KathyB]

The less achievement,
The less defeat.
What's the point of shovin'
Your way to the top?
Live 'n' laugh 'n' love 'n'
You're never a flop.
So, when the walls are crumbling...

[scenicdesign71]

This is the world I meant.  Couldn't you listen?
Couldn't you stay content, safe behind walls
As I could not?

[Leighton]

And though I cannot love you,
I wish that I could love you.

For now I'm seeing love like none I've ever known.
A love as pure as breath, as permanent as death.
Implacable as stone.

[KathyB]

You're either a poet
Or you're a lover
Or you're the famous
Benjamin Stone.
You take one road,
You try one door,
There isn't time for any more.
One's life consists of either/or.
One has regrets
Which one forgets,
And as the years go on...