Five & Dime

Lyrics

[Chorus] Imagine a world where the columns of the temple come to life At first stiff and then flexible and flowing Striding down the street A perfect reflection Of their inner beauty, inner glory Reaching here, helping there Until separation from their brother Is just a puzzling memory Instead of quietly sitting In their cubicles at work Wondering how this came to be [Verse 1] Marjorie works the diner at the fivе and dime (Which is the name of thе song) She makes sure that no one feels alone She's famous for her kindness And her Solomon's advice But if you saw her on the bus You'd not look twice [Verse 2] And hopelessly unmodern Millie Does not look right in a Cadillac She just doesn't Hopelessly unmodern Millie Does not sound right in comradely banter She can't seem to banter back But lead her to the ledger Of a hopeless nightmarish accounting mess And she can bring the columns back to life With her numerical tenderness [Chorus] Imagine a world where the columns of the temple come to life At first stiff and then flexible and flowing Striding down the street A perfect reflection Of their inner beauty, inner glory Reaching here, helping there Until separation from each other Is just a puzzling memory Instead of quietly sitting In their own apartments Five feet from each other Watching the same show on different TVs [Verse 3] And then there was Moose Who worked at the corner store If you talked to him about, say, spirituality He'd just shrug his huge shoulders "What?" He is everything you'd not want In a refined, romantic cavalier, I suppose But on the day they came up over that hill Well, he out-Thorred Thor [Verse 4] And Quincy, he's a hard-assed kid Who lives under the overpass downtown When he comes at you with a squeegee Well, you kinda sorta wanna duck down Sometimes you do But if a teen unseen A bird unheard, a struggling flower Should fail to take to song, to take to wing Quincy's the first one to their side He has that healing thing [Chorus] Imagine a world where the columns of the temple come to life At first stiff and then flexible and flowing Striding down the street A perfect reflection Of their inner beauty, inner glory Reaching here, helping there Until separation from each other Is just a puzzling memory Instead of quietly sitting At the family reunion saying Oh gosh, oh no, you don't want a picture of me Well, actually—we do [Outro] And Ramona She works the library cart in the Third Ward