Someone
Saved My Life Tonight
When I think of those East End lights
Muggy nights,
The curtains drawn in the little room downstairs.
Prima Donna lord you really should have been there,
Sitting like a princess perched in her electric chair.
And it's one more beer,
And I don't hear you anymore.
We've all gone crazy lately,
My friend's out there rolling,
Round the basement floor.
And someone saved my life tonight
Sugar bear.
You almost had your hooks in me
Didn't you dear
You nearly had me roped and tied,
Altar bound, hypnotized,
Sweet freedom whispered in my ear
You're a butterfly,
And butterflies are free to fly
Fly away,
high away
Bye bye.
I never realized the passing hours
Of evening showers,
A slip nose handing in my darkest dreams.
I'm strangled by your haunted social sense
Just a pawn out-played by a dominating queen.
It's four-o-clock in the morning
Damn it!
Listen to me good
I'm sleeping with myself tonight
Saved in time,
Thank God my music's still alive.
And someone saved my life tonight
Sugar bear.
You almost had your hooks in me
Didn't you dear
You nearly had me roped and tied,
Altar bound, hypnotized,
Sweet freedom whispered in my ear
You're a butterfly,
And butterflies are free to fly
Fly away,
high away
Bye bye.
It seems hard to believe that as I transcribe these words, this song
was released more than 20 years ago, while I was in Junior High. I had
not realized how early on the butterfly image surfaced for me. Over the
years
in high school, college, medical school and residency, the words
have provided me strength in time when one or another bad relationships
were ending (and many times I wished I had heeded the words about "flying
away"). It also speaks to those "Dark nights of the soul" those
times when we stay awake thinking, drinking, wondering, pondering life's
questions...often without a clear answer. It is important to remember
there is hope, in the image of the butterfly and freedom.