David McWilliams - Days Of Pearly Spencer

La chanson fut publiée en 1967, grande époque des pattes sur les joues, des vestes indiennes, des pat'def et de tout le folklore qui accompagna la pop revolution dont la Grande Bretagne fut le temple incontesté. On cherche vainement à Soho aujourd'hui les traces de cette grande période qui fit rêver nos aînés...

A tenement, a dirty street

Walked and worn by shoeless feet

Inside it’s long and so complete

Watched by a shivering sun

Old eyes in a small child’s face

Watching as the shadows race

Through walls and cracks and leave no trace

And daylight’s brightness shuns

The days of Pearly Spencer

The race is almost run

Nose pressed hard on frosted glass

Gazing as the swollen mass

On concrete fields where grows no grass

Stumbles blindly on

Iron trees smother the air

But withering they stand and stare

Through eyes that neither know nor care

Where the grass is gone

The days of Pearly Spencer

The race is almost run

Pearly where’s your milk white skin

What’s that stubble on your chin

It’s buried in the rot gut gin

You played and lost not won

You played a house that can’t be beat

Now look your head’s bowed in defeat

You walked too far along the street

Where only rats can run

The days of Pearly Spencer

The race is almost run

The days of Pearly Spencer

The race is almost run

The race is almost run

A tenement, a dirty street

Remember worn and shoeless feet

Remember how you stood to beat

The way your life had gone

So Pearly don’t you shed more tears

For those best forgotten years

Those tenements are memories

Of where you’ve risen from

The days of Pearly Spencer

The race is almost won