FERN-BAR BLUES

I used to laugh, I used to chuckle
About the guy in the bar with the folk guitar
And the beer hanging over his buckle
Paid to croon those wimpy tunes
I said "I know my luck'll never run so low."
But what did I know?
Because I gotta eat
I gotta eat a little crow

I've been a waiter, I've been a temp
I've had the horror of holding as many jobs
As Larry, Moe, and Shemp
But life could not prepare me
For the roll I now must fill
As a desperado on the dock of the bay
In Margaritaville

Oh, Lord
Lord can't you see I've paid my dues?
I've got the mellow-rock-folkie-
in-the-corner-of-a-fern-bar-blues

I'm getting' heckled, this group of fellas
Pushed to the brink by those very large drinks
With those very small umbrellas
They're well beyond reason, I must appease them
The tension is growing deadly
Can I reach in my soul and summon the strength
To
play
a
Don
Ho
medley?

chorus

There's
a
lady
at
the
bar,
she's
a
scary kind of creature
She's got hairs on every mole
and she's got moles on every feature
A gargoyle on a barstool, leering into my eyes
Licking off her lipstick and slugging down mai-tais

There's a two-ton drunken sailor
And my life is now imperilled
Cause I blew the last line of the 17th verse
of The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
There's a real estate man with a tanning-booth tan
Demanding to hear "Piano Man"
And the bag at the bar just sent me a beer
And I think that it's time to get out of here

Oh, Lord
Lord can't you see I've paid my dues?
I've
got
the
mellow-rock-folkie-
abandoning-hope-at-the-end-of-his-rope-
in-the-corner-of-a-fern-bar-blues